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I. IL ][ AM S H AX S Y E A IRE ,

THE

PLAYS AND POEMS

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE

WITH THE

CORRECTIONS AND ILLUSTRATIONS

VARIOUS COMMENTATORS:

COMPREHENDING

Siaifeoftfie pott,

AND

AN ENLARGED HISTORY OF THE STAGE,

THE LATE EDMOND MALONE.

WITH A NEW GLOSSARIAL INDEX.

TH2 4>T2En2 rPAMMATET2 HN, TON KAAAMON
AHOBPEXriN EI2 NOTN. Vet. Auct. apud Suidam.

VOL. II.

LONDON:

PRINTED FOR F. C. AND J. RIVINGTON ; T. EGERTON } J. CUTHELL ; SCATCHERD
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1821.

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New Bridge- street, London.

VOL.11. PROLEGOMENA.

THE

LIFE

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

SECTION I.

Of all the accounts of literary men which have
heen given to the world, the history of the life of
Shakspeare ^ would be the most curious and in-

* Before we proceed further, it may be proper to ascertain the
orthography of our poet's name. That the pronunciation of his
own time was Shakspeare, is proved decisively, by illiterate
persons, who spelt by the ear, writing the name either Shax^
spere, or Shachpere ; of which, instances from authentick docu-
ments will be given hereafter: and that he himself wrote his
name without the middle e, appears from his autograph, of which
a fac-simile will be found in a subsequent page. With respect
to the last syllable of his name, the people of Stratford appear to
have generally written the name Shakspere, or Shachpere : and
I have now great doubts whether he did not frequently write the
final syllable so himself ; for I suspect that what was formerly
supposed to be the letter a over his autograph above-mentioned,
was only a coarse and broad mark of a contraction ; and in the
signatures of his name subscribed to his will (as a very ingenious
anonymous correspondent observes to me), certainly the letter a
is not to be found in the second syllable. It should be remem-
bered, that in all words where per occurred, in old English
VOT,. IT. B

THE LIFE OF

structive, if we were acquainted with the minute cir-
cumstances of his fortunes, the course and extent of

writing, this contraction (jp) was generally substituted. The true
origin, I believe, of his countrymen thus spelling the latter part
of his name, was this : instead of speare (hasta) following the
sound, they constantly wrote spere ; and hence the name of
Sperepoynt, another family in Stratford, was thus exhibited. Mr.
Jlichard Quiney, and many of the Stratfordians, in consequence of
this being the common mode of spelling the word spear or speare,
and of being used to the contraction above-mentioned, frequently
wrote our poet's name thus : Mr. Shaksp. ; and in some of the
writings of the borough, I have found the name written at length
Shaksper, which was probably the vulgar pronunciation. But as
spere was a mispelling of the word speare, from the cause already
assigned ; and as it is not so properly old spelling, as false spell-
ing ; in my opinion it ought not to be adopted in exhibiting our
author's name at this day ; and therefore I write Shakspeare, and
not Shakspere. Mr. Thomas Greene, a solicitor in Chancery,
a contemporary and relation of our author, followed the ortho-
graphy which we now adopt, as will be seen hereafter.

The various modes in which our poet's name has been exhi-
bited, have been the subject of much disquisition; but those who
are conversant with the laxity of ancient orthography, must have
met with so many instances of the same kind, that this variance
can be no novelty to them. " The same surname (says Fuller, in
his English Worthies, p. 51), hath been variously altered in
writing: first, because time teacheth new orthography, altering
'spelling, as well as speaking : secondly, the best gentlemen an-
ciently were not the best scholars ; and, minding matters of more
moment, were somewhat too incurious in their names. Besides,
writers engrossing deeds were not over-critical in spelling of
names, knowing well where the person appeared the same, the
simplicity of that age would not fall out about misnomer. Lastly,
ancient families have been often removed into several coun-
ties, where several writings follow the several pronunciations."
So variously was the name of Percy written, that the learned and
ingenious Bishop of Dromore has, I think, enumerated above
twenty different ancient modes of spelling that name. The name
of Villiers, Fuller observes, was spelt fourteen different ways : and

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

his studies, and the means and gradations whereby
he acquired that consummate knowledge of mankind,
which, for two centuries, has rendered him the delight
and boast of his countrymen : but many of the mate-
in the spelling of the name of Gascoygne, Thoresby and Oldys
have exhibited twenty-one variations. Sir Walter Ralegh has
vrritten his name in a book in the Bodleian Library, as I now have
done ; yet his contemporaries much more frequently wrote Rauo-
leigh^ or Raleigh, or Ravoley ; nor was he himself, I believe, uni-
form in his practice. Mr. Abraham Sturley, an alderman of
Stratford, with whom the reader will be better acquainted here-
after, as often wrote his name Strelley as Sturley : and the name of
our poet's son-in-law was written Haxjole, Halle, Haule, and
Hall ; in the first and the last of these ways he himself wrote it
at different periods of his life. A similar variance is to be found
in the names of Burghley, v^^hich is exhibited in four or five dif-
ferent ways ; of Habington the historian (frequently written and
printed Abingfon), Massinger and Dekker the poets, and many
others. Edward Alleyn, the player, wrote his name sometimes
Allin, sometimes Allen, and at others Aleyn or Alleyn. The
names of Heminges and Condell, our poet's fellow comedians, are
written differently in the very volume which they themselves pub-
lished. And lastly, to come nearer to our own time, instead of
John Dry den, the name to which we are now familiarized, we
have before the second edition of his Essay of Dramatick Poesie,
and also in an advertisement in the London Gazette, N' 1, John
Dreyden; and in the last page this name was also writte Driden
and Drey don.

Fuller, writing on this subject, concludes like a tru^ antiquary :
*' However such diversity appeareth in the eye of others, I dare
profess that I am delighted with the prospect thereof." Though
I fear my readers may not have so much enthusiasm (as I *' dare
profess " I have not), yet I trust they will pardon the length of
this disquisition, which perhaps nothing but the name of Shak-
speare could justify. Under the protection of that seven-fold
shield an editor may set criticks and cavillers at defiance.

B 2

THE LIFE OF

rials for such a biographical detail being now un-
attainable, we must content ourselves with such par-
ticulars as accident has preserved, or the most sedu-
lous industry has been able to collect.

From Sir William Dugdale, who was born in 1605,
and bred at the school of Coventry, but twenty miles
from Stratford upon Avon, and whose Antiquities of
Warwickshire appeared in 1656, only thirty years after
the death of our poet, we might reasonably have ex-
pected some curious memorials of his illustrious
countryman : but he has not given us a single parti-
cular of his private life ; contenting himself with a
very slight mention of him in his account of the
church and tombs of Stratford upon Avon.

The next biographical printed notice that I have
found, is in Fuller's Worthies, folio, 1662, in Warvv^ick-
shire, p. 116 ; where there is a short quibbling account
of our poet, furnishing very little information concern-
ing him. In Theatrum Poetarum, which was not
published till 1675 (though in the Bodleian, and other
catalogues, that book is mentioned as having appeared
in MDCLX, in consequence of the last two figures
(xv) having, in some copies, dropped out of their
place, at the press), Edward Phillips gives this cha-
racter of our author :

" William Shakspeare, the glory of the English
stage, whose nativity at Stratford upon Avon is the
highest honour that town can boast of, from an actoi
of tragedies and comedies, he became a maker ; and
such a maker, that though some others may perhaps
pretend to a more exact decorum and economy, espe-
cially in tragedy, never any expressed a more lofty
and tragick height ; never any represented nature

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

more purely to the life : and where the polishments
of art are most wanting^ as probably his learning was
not extraordinary, he pleaseth with a certain wild and
native elegance ; and in all his writings hath an un-
vulgar style, as well in his Venus and Adonis, his
Rape of Lucrece, and other various poems, as in his
dramaticks."

I had long since observed, in the margin of my
copy of this book, that the hand of Milton, who was
the author's uncle, might be traced in the preface, and
in the passage above quoted. The book was licensed
for publication two months before the death of that
poet. My late friend, Mr. Warton, has made the
same observation.

Winstanley, in his Lives of the Poets, 8vo. 1687,
merely transcribed Dugdale and Fuller; nor did
Langbaine, in I69I, Blount, in 1694, or Gildon, in
1699, add any thing to the former meagre accounts
of our poet.

That Antony Wood, who was himself a native of
Oxford (but thirty-six miles from Stratford), and was
born but fourteen years after the death of our author,
should not have collected any anecdotes of Shak-
speare, has always appeared to me extraordinary.
Though Shakspeare had no direct title to a place in
the Athenae Oxonienses, that diligent antiquary could
have easily found a niche for his Life, as he has done
for many others, not bred at Oxford. The Life of
Davenant afforded him a very fair opportunity for
such an insertion.

About the year 1680, that very curious and inde-
fatigable searcher after anecdotes relative to the

THE LIFE OF

eminent writers of England, Mr. John Aubrey, col-
lected some concerning Shakspeare, which I shall
have occasion to mention more particularly hereafter.

But the person from whom we should probably
have derived the most satisfactory intelligence con-
cerning our poet's theatrical history, was his contem-
porary, and fellow comedian, Thomas Heywood, had
he executed a work which he appears to have long had
in contemplation. In the margin of Braithwaite's
Survey of Histories, 4to. 1614, I find the following
note : " Homer, an excellent and heroicke poet, sha-
dowed only, because my judicious friend, Maister
Thomas Heywood, hath taken in hand, by his great
industry, to make a general, though summary, de-
scription of all the poets." Heywood himself, twenty
years afterwards, mentions the same scheme, in a note
to his Hierarchy of the Blessed Angels, folio, 1635,
p. 245, in which he says, that he intends " to com-
mit to the publick view. The Lives of the Poets,
foreign and modern, from the first before Homer, to
the novissimi and last, of what nation or language
soever ; " but, unfortunately, the work was never
published. Browne, the pastoral poet, who was
also Shakspeare's contemporary, had a similar in-
tention of writing the Lives of the English Poets ;
which, however, he never executed.

Though, between 1640 and 1670, the Lives of
Hooker, Donne, Wotton, and Herbert, were given to
the publick by Isaac Walton, and in 1679 some ac-
count of Spencer was prefixed to a folio edition of his
works, neither the booksellers, who republished our
author's plays in 1664 and 1665, employed any

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

person to write the Life of Shakspeare ; nor did
Dryden, though a warm admirer of his productions,
or any other poet, collect any materials for such a
work, till Mr. Rowe, about the year 1707, undertook
an edition of his plays. Unfortunately, that was not
an age of curiosity or inquiry : for Dryden might
have obtained some intelligence from the old actors,
who died about the time of the Restoration, when he
was himself near thirty years old ; and still more au-
thentick accounts from our poet's grand-daughter.
Lady Barnard, who did not die till 1670. His sister,
Joan Hart, was living in 1646 ; his eldest daughter,
Susanna Hall, in 1649 ; and his second daughter,
Judith Queeny, in 1662.

Of those who were not thus nearly connected with our
poet, a large list of persons presents itself, from whom,
without doubt, much intelligence concerning him
might have been obtained, between the time of the
publication of the second folio edition of his works, in
1632, and of Mr. Rowe's Life, in 1709.

Francis Meres, who will be more particularly men-
tioned hereafter, and who appears to have been well
acquainted with the stage, when our author first ap-
peared as a dramatick writer, lived till 1646.

Richard Braithwaite, a very voluminous poet, was
born in 1588, and commenced a writer some years
before the death of Shakspeare. Having once, as it
should seem, had thoughts of compiling a history of
the English poets, he probably was particularly
anxious to learn all such circumstances as might
be most conducive to such an undertaking. He

THE LIFE OF

died in 1673, at the age of eighty-five. To him
may be added, 1. Dr. Jasper Mayne ; 2. Penelope
Lady Spencer ; 3. John, the second Lord Stanhope ;
4. Sir Aston Cockaine; 5. William Cavendish,
Duke of Newcastle; and, 6. Frances Countess of
Dorset ; v^ho all died between the time of the
Restoration and the year 1695 ; and Sir Robert
Atkins, Sir Richard Verney, and Sir William
Bishop, whose lives were extended to the beginning
of the eighteenth century.

Jasper Mayne, who had written two papers of
verses on our author, in 1623, lived till 1671.

Penelope Lady Spencer, who died in 1667, sixty-
nine years old, probably had heard, in her youth, some
particulars concerning Shakspeare, from her father,
his great patron.

Not only the age of John, the second Lord Stan-
hope, but the papers which he must have derived
from his father, the first Lord, must have furnished
him with many curious particulars respecting the
plays of Shakspeare and his contemporaries. Sir
John Stanhope, the first Lord Stanhope, was ap-
pointed, in 1595, Treasurer of the Chambers,
through whose hand passed all money disbursed for
plays exhibited at Court ; and continued possessed of
this office till March, 1620-21, when he died. His
son, the second Lord, was born in 1595 ; was made a
Knight of the Bath in 1610 ; and lived to the age of
eighty-three, dying in 1677.

How conversant Sir Aston Cockaine was with the
history of our poets, particularly the dramatick poets,

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

his own works ahimdantly prove. He was horn in
1606, and died in 1684, in the seventy-eighth year of
his age.

William Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle, himself a
dramatick poet, and a patron of Ben Jonson, in the
latter days of that writer, could hardly have failed
to have heard much of Shakspeare, in his youth. He
was horn in 1592, made a Knight of the Bath in
1610, and died on Christmas-day, 1676, at the age
of eighty-four. At the time of Shakspeare's death,
he was twenty-four years old,

Frances, the wife of Richard, the fifth Earl of
Dorset, and mother of Charles Earl of Dorset, the
patron of Dry den, was, according to tradition, ex-
tremely intimate with Sir John Suckling, a professed
admirer of our poet. This lady, who was born in
1619 or 1620, and married in 1637, lived till
1693.

Some account of Shaks23eare's domestick habits
and private life, it may be presumed, might have
been obtained from Sir William Bishop, of Bridge-
town, adjoining Stratford upon Avon, who was born
in 1626, and died there in 1700. His father. Sir
Richard Bishop, who might have been personally ac-
quainted with the poet, was born in 1585, and died
at Bridgetown, in 1673, at the age of eighty-eight.

Sir Robert Atkins, Knight of the Bath, and Chief
Baron of the Exchequer, died in 1709, at the great
age of eighty-eight. Being fond of antiquarian re-
searches, he, doubtless, was not inattentive to the
history of our early poets ; and being himself born in

THE LIFE OF

1621, five years only after Shakspeare's death, had an
opportunity of learning many particulars concerning
him, from his father, who was born in 1588, and died
in 1669, at the age of eighty-two.

To these numerous sources of information may
be added one more, whence even Mr. Rowe him-
self might probably have obtained much information,
in I7O8, when he was collecting materials for his
Life of Shakspeare ; I mean Sir Richard Verney, of
Compton Murdock, about eight miles from Stratford,
the first Lord Willoughby de Broke. He was born
in January, 1621-2, and survived the publication of
Mr. Rowe's edition of Shakspeare, dying at the great
age of ninety, July 18, 1711. He is described
by Wright, in his History of Rutlandshire, as
" a true lover of antiquities, and a worthy Maecenas;"
and without doubt had, in his early days, made
some inquiries concerning his illustrious countryman,
from his father, who was born in 1588, and died in
1642, when Sir Richard was twenty years old. His
grandfather, Sir Richard Verney, who was born in
1563, and died in 1630, often sat in commission, as a
Justice of Peace, at Stratford, before Shakspeare re-
moved to London. He married a daughter of Sir
Fulke Greville, the elder, who was many years Re-
corder of Stratford ; and his mother was Jane, one of
the sisters of Sir Thomas Lucy, Shakspeare's sup-
posed prosecutor.

That almost a century should have elapsed, from
the time of his death, without a single attempt
having been made to discover any circumstance which

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

could throw a light on the history of his private life,
or literary career ; that, when the attempt was made,
it should have been so imperfectly executed by the
very ingenious and elegant dramatist who undertook
the task ; and that for a period of eighty years ^
afterwards, during which this " god of our idolatry "
ranked as high among us as any poet ever did in any
country, all the editors of his works, and each succes-
sive English biographer, should have been contented
with Mr. Rowe's meagre and imperfect narrative ; are
circumstances which cannot be contemplated without
astonishment.

The information which I have been able to collect
on this subject, even at this late day, however in-
adequate to my wishes, having far exceeded my most
sanguine expectation, the perusal of the following
pages, while it will ascertain the numerous errors and
inaccuracies which have been so long and so patiently
endured, and transmitted from book to book, will, I
trust, at the same time, show, in some small degree,
what may be done in biographical researches, even at
a remote period, by a diligent and ardent spirit of in-
quiry : it must, however, necessarily be accompanied
with a deep, though unavailing regret, that the same
ardour did not animate those who lived nearer our
author's time, whose inquiries could not fail to have
been rewarded with a superior degree of success. The
negligence and inattention of our English writers,
after the Restoration, to the history of the celebrated
men who preceded them, can never be mentioned

* In 1790, the present writer endeavoured, in some degree, to
supply the defects of Mr. Rowe's short narrative, by adding to it
copious annotations.

THE LIFE OF

without surprise and indignation. If Suetonius and
Plutarch had been equally incurious, some of the
most valuable remains of the ancient world would
have been lost to posterity.

William Shakspeare was the son of John
Shakspeare, by Mary, the youngest daughter of
Robert Arden ^ of Wilmecote in the county of
Warwick, Esquire, and Agnes Webb, his wife \

3 This family is of great antiquity in the county of Warwick.
The woodland part of that county was anciently called Arderne,
whence they derived their name. " I learned at Warwike
(says Leland), that the most part of the shire of Warwike that
lyeth as Avon river descendeth, on the right hand or ripe of it,
is in Arden (for soe is [the] ancient name of that part of the
shire) ; and the ground in Arden is much enclosed, plentifuU of
grasse, but not of corne. The other parte of Warwikeshire that
lyeth on the left hand or ripe of Avon river, much to the south,
is for the most part champion, somewhat barren of wood, but
plentifull of corne." Itin. vol. iv. p. 2, fol. 166, a. So also Cam-
den : " Woodland trans Avonem ad septentriones expanditur
spatio multo majori, tota nemoribus infessa, nec tamen sine pas-
cuis, arvis, et variis ferri venis. Hsec, ut hodie Woodland, id est,
regio sylvestris, ita etiam Ardern antiquiori nomine olim dice-
batur, verum eadem plane, ut existimo, significatione. Ardern
enim priscis Britannis et Gallis sylvam significasse videtur, cum
in Gallia sylvam maximam Ardern, oppidum in Flandria juxta
alteram sylvam Ardenburg, et celebratam illam Anglise sylvam
truncato vocabulo Den nominari videamus. Ex hac Turkillus de
Ardern, qui hie floruit magno honore sub Henrico primo
[A. D. 1100], nomen assumpsit, et propago ejus admodum clara
longe per Angliam succedentibus annis est diffusa." Britan,
p. .501, edit. 1600.

The original name, Arderne, was in process of time softened
into Arden, anterior, as it should seem, to the forest of Den being

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 13

The name of Shakspeare, or Shakespeare, for so,
without doubt, it was originally written, were we to

thus denominated. Our ancestors were always extremely fond
of abbreviations {vocabula truncata), and seem to have had a
peculiar aversion to the letter r, which they very frequently omitted,
by placing a line or stroke over the word as a mark of the abbre-
viation. Arderne being generally thus written {_Ardene], the r
was at length wholly omitted in writing and speaking. The
successive representatives of the family of Arden, however, ac-
cording to the capricious modes of ancient spelling, were by no
means uniform in writing their names ; some exhibiting it in one
way, some in another. In Leland's time, the name, we find, had
acquired the softer sound which we now give it: indeed, a century
before, if Fuller is correct, Robert Arden (not Ardern), Esq.
of Bromwick, was returned in the list of the gentry of this county
by the commissioners appointed for that purpose in the twelfth
year of King Henry VI. A. D. 1433.

Many other names have undergone a similar change. Thus the
name of Nangle, in process of time became Nagle ; Grenville,
became Greville ; the word Nursery^ became Nurs'ey^ &c.

4 Usually pronounced Wincot. So, Mr. William Clapton, in
his will, made May 9, 1521, devises Clapton and Wyncote to his
executors till they shall have received 200 marks, as a marriage
portion for Elizabeth his daughter.

This village was formerly more considerable than it is at pre-
sent, having had a church, as appears by the Register of the
Guild of the Holy Cross at Stratford. " Raphe Couper, rector
of the church at littell Wilraicote, was admitted into the brother-
hood of the Gild, An°. Dni. 1408, x Henry iiii." fol. iii. b.

The tithes of this rectory do not appear to have belonged to
the Guild of the Holy Cross in the 22d year of Henry VIII.
(1530) ; not being mentioned in the Rent-RoU of the Guild
for that year, now among the archives of Stratford ; but in the
37th of Henry VIII. according to a survey then made (Dug-
dale's Antiq. of Warw. p. 485), " the lands and tenements
of the Guild, with the tithes of Wylmyncotef certified to belong
thereto, were valued at 50/. 23a?. ob. per ann." In a Rent-Roil,

THE LIFE OF

regard etymology, might lead us to suppose that the
founder of this family, in the tenth or eleventh cen-
tury, hefore surnames became common, had, like
Longue-espee, or Longsword, Earl of Salisbury ^, dis-
tinguished himself by military achievements, and
thence obtained this designation ; but I know not
that the history of other families of kindred denomi-
nation, of the family of Spearepoint, in Stratford,
or of Nicholas Breakspeare, better known by the title
of Pope Adrian the Fourth, whose names denote a
similar origin, would warrant such an hypothesis.
It is, however, a very probable conjecture, and coun-
tenanced by a learned antiquary, who was contempo-

Ed. VI. [154-7], I find the tithes of Wilmecote were then let at
205. per. ann., and the total revenue of the guild was 49/.
185. 8Jfl?.

5 Agnes Webbe was a native of Bearley, a village about three
miles from Wilmecote. In the proceedings of a court leet held
at Stratford in April, 1558, I find the following entry: ** Raf
Cawdrey for making a fray upon Alexander Web of Bereley^ he
stands amerced xCidy

From the will of Mrs. Arden, of which a more particular ac-
count will be given hereafter, it appears that she was sister to
Alexander Webbe. She survived her husband twenty-four years,
as appears from the register of the parish of Aston Cantlow, in
which, among the burials, is found — " 1580 The xxix"" daye of
Dec. was buried Agnes Arden, wyddow." Christopher Arden
was buried there August 8, 1581; and Elizabeth Arden March
29, 1588 : but I know not in what degree of relationship they
stood to our poet's grandfather.

6 William, Earl of Salisbury, a natural son of Henry II. by fair
Rosamond, if we may believe the metrical romance of Richard
Coeurde Lion, acquired the title of Longue-espee, in consequence
of his gallant exploits at the siege of Messina, under our Richard
the First, when he was on his way to the Holy Land.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 15

rary with our author^. His townsmen, indeed, ap-
pear to have paid no attention to the etymology of
his name ; but very soon after he became known to
the literary world, its heroick and martial sound was
recognized and alluded to in some encomiastick
verses, of which even our poet had reason to be proud.

Whatever may have been the origin of the name,
the family of Shakspeare is of great antiquity in the
county of Warwick, and was established long before
our poet's time, in the woodland part of it, princi-
pally at Rowington ® and Lapworth ^ ; from which

7 •« Breakspear, Shakspear, and the lyke, have byn surnames
imposed upon the first bearers of them, for valour and Jeates of
armes." Verstegan*s Restitution of Decayed Intelligence^ 4to.
1605, p. 294-. See also Camden's Remaines, 4to. 1605, p. 111.

Nicolas Breakspeare, as well as our poet, bore arms which
have a reference to his name ; a broken lance, &c. See his
arms accurately described in the Notes on N. Upton's treatise De
Militari Studio, p. 46.

^ No information concerning the Shakspeares of Rowington
during the fifteenth century, at which period, and probably long
before, they flourished there, can be obtained from the register
of that parish, the earliest register being lost, and the oldest book
now extant commencing in 1639. But other documents fully as-
certain what is stated in the text.

** Will". Wethyford of the parish of Rownton in the county of
Warwick," made his will 31st March, 1564 ; and it was proved at
Worcester, on the 25th of Feb, 1574. An inventory of his effects
is annexed with the following title :

This is the Inventorye of all and singular the goodes and cat-
tel of Willm Wethyford of Rownton, latelye deceased, praysed by
Jhon Benett, Rich^. Shakspere, Willi. Ley & Thomas Ley, the
xiii day of September, 1564." Bundle of Willsy sub an, 1574, in
the Consistory Office at Worcester.

From the will of John Shaxpere of Rowington, made the
26th of June, 1574, it appears that he had two sons, and one

THE LIFE OF

places several of them branched out, and settled at
Wroxall \ Knowle ^, Claverdon ^, W arwick ^, Balsal,
Stratford, Hampton ^, and Snitterfield.

daughter. To his son Thomas he bequeathed twenty pounds ;
to his son George, his " freeland called Madge Wattons ;" to his
daughter Annis, fifteen marks, to be paid on the day of her mar-
riage. The testator mentions a brother of the name of Nicholas.
That part of the paper which contained an account of the probate,
being torn off, and wanting, I know not when he died. Bundle of
Wills, sub an. 1574-, ut supra.

George, the younger son of the above-mentioned John, died in
1628 ; and by his will, made Jan. SO, 1627 [8], devised to his son
Thomas, Madge Wattons, adjoining to Schrewle heath, in the pa-
rish of Hatton, and after the death of his wife his copyhold in
Rowington. Bundle of Wills in 1627, ut supra,

Richard Shnxsper, the elder, of Rowington, probably the person
mentioned in the inventory annexed to the will of William Withy-
ford, in 1564^, made his will, Sept. 6. 1591. He had four sons;
John, Roger, Thomas, and William. John was then married,
and had three sons born, of which the eldest was Thomas.
Richard Shaxper died between Sept. 1591, and March 31, 1592:
his will having been proved on that day. Bundle of Wills, sub
an, 1592, ut supra.

From the Court Rolls of the manor of Rowington (from which
I have been obligingly furnished with an extract by Mr. John
Payne, of Coventry, Attorney at Law), it appears that John
Shakspeare, the eldest son of Richard above-mentioned, died in
1609; and that Thomas Shakspeare was admitted to the Hill
Farm as his son and heir. This Thomas, from his will, which was
made in 1614, appears to have been a meal man, or baker, and
lived at Mouseley End, in Rowington. May 5, 1614, his widow
was admitted in the Court Baron to her free-bench, and after-
wards surrendered to her son John, who was then admitted ac-
cordingly. He died in Feb. 1652-3, leaving two sons, William,
who died in 1690, and John, who died in 1710.

Another Richard Shaxper oi Rowington, who is likewise styled
the elder, died in April, 1614. His sons, as appears from his
will, were William, Richard, Thomas, and John. Richard, the
younger, had four sons then living, all minors ; and William had

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 17

Our poet's family, says Mr. Rowe, " as appears by
the register and publick writings of Stratford, were of

one son, named John, likewise a minor. Bundle of Wills, sub
an. 1614, ut supra. Richard the elder having surrendered a mes-
suage in Turner's End, or Church End, Rowington, to the use of
his youngest son John (who was a weaver), after the death of
himself and his wife Elizabeth, the eldest son, William, contested
this disposition. From a bill filed by John against William, in
May, 1616, and the answer of William in the same year, it appears
that the copyhold and tenement above-mentioned had been pos-
sessed by the father for fifty years. In Tur. Londin. Record
Office i S. xiv. 57.

In May, 1595, a bill was filed by Thomas Shackspeare, of Row-
ington, yeoman, and Mary his wife, daughter and heir of William
Mathew, deceased, against William Rogers. This Thomas claimed,
in right of his wife, " a messuage and tenement with the appur-
tenances in Rowington and Claredon, and of certain lands in
Hatton Schrewle, Rowington, and Pinley." This bill contains
nothing else worth notice ; and is only mentioned here, as ascer-
taining the existence of such a person. In Tur. Lond. Record
Office, Ss. xi. 32.

Various branches of the family of Shakspeare continued at
Rowington, during the last and present century. The only per-
son, as I have been informed, now remaining in that parish of the
name of Shakspeare, is a person who keeps a publick house at a
place called Pinley Green, the son of Thomas Shakspeare, black-
smith, who died in 1785. The Hill Farm, however, above-men-
tioned, which descended from Richard Shakspeare who died in
1592, was possessed by the late Mr. William Shakspeare, of
Knowle Hall, who died in August, 1762, at the age of seventy-five,
and, as I learn from Mr. John Payne, of Coventry, attorn ey-at-
law, is now the property of Mr. John Edward Yarrow, the fifth in
descent from Mary Shakspeare, grand-daughter of John Shak-
speare, who, as we have already seen, died in 1609.

9 It appears from the register of Lapworth, that William Hart
and Alice Shakspeare were married there, October 15, 1564. We
shall presently see that our poet's sister, Joan Shakspeare, married
a William Hart, at Stratford, in or before 1 599, who might have
VOL. II. * C

THE LIFE OF

good figure and fashion there, and are mentioned as
gentlemen:' But this statement is extremely in-
been the son of William Hart, of Lapworth. There were, how-
ever. Harts settled at Stratford early in the 16th century.

Anne, the daughter of George Shakspeare, was baptized at
Lapworth, Feb. 7, 1586.

Richard, the son of George Shakspeare and Elizabeth, his wife,
was baptized there, Jan. 18, 1590.

John Shakspeare and Mary Huett [Hewitt] were married there
Feb. 16, 1617.

Alice, the wife of John Shakspeare, was buried there, July 21,
1624^

John Shakspeare and Mary Whiting were married there, Nov. 7,
1628.

Humphry Shakspeare, of Lapworth, was buried at Rovvington,
October 30, 1729; and Sarah, his wife, was buried there some
years before, October 4, 1720, aged eighty-two.

John Shakspeare died at Lapworth in 1637, and bequeathed
two shillings a-year to the poor ot he parish for ever.

In the Chirographer's Office I found a fine levied in 1603 by
George Robins to Joseph Shakspeare, of Lapworth.

* John Shaxper, of Wroxall, labourer, made his will, Dec. 17,
1574, and died in Jan. 1574-5, leaving one son, named Edward.
He mentions in his will his brother William ; and his cousin
Laurence Shaxper, of Balsal. Bundle of Wills j sub an. "[515,
ut supra.

William Shaxpeare, of Wroxall, husbandman, made his will
April 17, 1609, and died some time before April 11, 1613, when it
was proved at Worcester. He was probably a nephew to the
preceding. Bundle of Wills, sub an. 1613, ut supra,

2 The early register of the hamlet of Knowle is lost ; but there
was in the present century a respectable family of the name of
Shakspeare established at Knowle Hall.

3 From the Chirographer's Office I have been furnished with
the following note of a fine levied Mich. 12 Jac. I. [1614.]
*' Warwickshire. — Between William Shakespeare and George
Shakespeare, Plfs, and Thomas Spencer, Esq^^ Christopher

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

accurate and erroneous. From such a representation,
it might naturally be supposed, that a long series of
ancestors, all denominated gentlemen, might be found
in the archives of Stratford ; but neither the parish-
register, nor any other ancient document that I have
met with there (and I have examined several hun-
dred), furnishes the slightest notice of even his pater-
nal grandfather ; nor is any one of the family styled,
in the register, gentleman, except the poet himself,
though his immediate ancestor, in consequence of the
office which he held, ranked, during the last thirty

Flecknoe and Thomas Tompson, Deforciants, of eight acres
of pasture, with the appurtenants, in Claverdon, otherwise
Clardon."

4 In the Rolls Chapel I found a deed enrolled, which was made
in the 44?th year of Queen Elizabeth [1601-2], conveying to
Thomas Shakespeare of Warwick, yeoman, Sachbroke, alias
Bishop Sachbroke in Com. Warr."

Thomas Shaxper, of Warwick, shoemaker, as appears by his will,
in the registry of Worcester, died in 1577, possessed of the lord-
ship of Balsal ; leaving three sons, William, Thomas, and John,
and one daughter, married to Francis Ley: another, Thomas
Shakspeare, perhaps the second son of the preceding, made his
will, Aug. 20, 1631, and died in 1632. By an inventory annexed
to his will, his personal effects appear to have been worth 150/.
3*. Qd. Bundle of Wills, sub an. 1632, ut supra. In 1619, when
the visitation of Warwick was made by Sampson Lennard and
Augustin Vincent, deputies for William Camden, Thomas Shak-
speare was one of the burgesses of Warwick. He mentions his
shop in his will ; and I suspect that he was a butcher. A fine was
levied by one Thomas Shakspeare to Michael Lee, in Michael-
mas Term, 1608, of lands in Nuneaton, in the county of Warwick.

5 In the register of Stratford, we find that Elizabeth, the daugh-
ter of Anthony Shakspeare, of Hampton, was baptized Feb. 10^
1583-4^.

C 2

THE LIFE OF

years of his life, with the most respectable persons in
that town, and was denominated by an honourable
addition, being styled, in the parochial register,
Mayster Shakspeare.

There is good ground for believing that John
Shakspeare, the father of our great dramatick poet,
was not originally of Stratford upon Avon. A very
curious and well-preserved register is yet extant,
which formerly belonged to the gild of the Holy
Cross at Stratford, containing an account of all the
masters, aldermen, procurators, brothers, and
sisters of that gild, from the time of King Henry
the Fourth to its dissolution, in the time of Edward
the Sixth. In this ancient record, which I have care-
fully examined, during the entire reigns of Henry
the Seventh and Henry the Eighth, the name of
Shakspeare does not once occur ; though the names
of most of the other families, which were of any con-
sideration at Stratford in the time of Queen Eliza-
beth, are found there ; such as Clopton, Quiney,
Combe, Underbill, Lewes, Sadler, Smith, Tmssel,
Jefferies, Reynolds, Gilbert, Parsons, Rogers, Bole,
Hunt, Hill, Whatley, Gibbes, Phillips, Roberts,
&c. In another very ancient manuscript, commenc-
ing with the reign of Henry the Eighth, in which the
names of the wardens of the bridge of Stratford are
preserved, antecedent to that tovsm's being incorpo-
rated by King Edward the Sixth, the name cf Shak-
speare no where appears ; nor among the tenants of
the lands belonging to the gild, whose names are
enumerated in a rent-roll, made in October, 1530, and
also in the charter granted to this town in 1553,

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

amounting, I think, to seventy-one, does the name of
any of our poet's ancestors, at either period, occur : all
which circumstances afford a strong confirmation of
what I have suggested. In further support of this
conjecture, it may also be observed, that in Dethick
and Camden's grant of arms, in 1599, John Shak-
speare is styled " now of Stratford upon Avon ; "
from which it may plausibly be inferred that his son,
from whom they received their instructions, knew
that he had not been originally of that town : but as
the word now does not occur in the preceding grant
of 1596, and may have been formal rather than sig-
nificant, this argument, it must be owned, is not of
much force, though, connected with others, it may
have some weight.

The heralds, in their grant or confirmation of
arms to John Shakspeare, in 1599, by omitting the
Christian name of our poet's mother, and writing, by
mistake, JVellingcote, instead of Wilmecote^ as the
place of her father's residence, involved the history of
this family in great difficulty and confusion. In their
former grant, indeed, in 1596, which I shall soon have
occasion to mention, they were more accurate, and
had rightly described the lady to whom mankind is so
much indebted, as well as the place of her birth : a
circumstance which has hitherto escaped the micro-
scopick eye of the antiquary. Could any doubt still
remain on this subject, it would be removed by the
will of Robert Arden, our poet's maternal grandfather,
which I discovered in the Consistory Office at Wor-
cester, as well as by other ancient documents, which
I shall hereafter have occasion to quote. From this

THE LIFE OF

will, compared with that of his widow, preserved in
the same office, we learn, that the mother of our poet
was the youngest of, at least, four daughters, and was
a favourite of her father, being appointed one of his
executors, in conjunction with her eldest sister, and
in preference to his wife. The personal fortune of
Mr. Arden, as appears from an inventory annexed to
his will, amounted only to seventy-seven pounds,
eleven shillings, and ten-pence. He had likewise, we
find, some property in the neighbouring manor of
Snitterfield ; and this circumstance, perhaps, was the
occasion of John Shakspeare's introduction to his
daughter ; for there are some grounds for supposing
that he had some relations settled at Snitterfield, a town
about three miles from Stratford. From a declara-
tion filed in the Bailiff's Court, at Stratford, where
an action of debt was brought, by Nicholas Lane,
against John Shakspeare (our poet's father, I believe),
in Hilary Term, 29 EHz. [1587], it should seem
that he had a brother of the name of Henry ; and
another paper, which I have also found among the
archives of Stratford, informs us that Henry Shak-
speare was of Snitterfield ®.

8 To the will of Christopher Smyth, otherwise Court, of Strat-
ford upon Avon, made Nov. 2, 1586, and proved at Stratford,
Dec. 2. in the same year, is subjoined a list of " Debts due to the
said Christopher."

«♦ It. Henry Shakspere of Snytterfield oweth me ix^."

It appears from tlie register of the parish of Snitterfield that
Henry Shakspeare was buried there Dec. 29, 1596 ; and Marga-
ret, his widow, was buried there a few weeks afterwards, Feb. 6,
1596-7.

There was also a Thomas Shakspeare settled at Snitterfield ;

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

Mr. Arden had, without doubt, frequent occasion
to visit Stratford ^ it being a considerable market-
town, and much better furnished with both the neces-
saries and luxuries of life than Wilmecote. The
business of the law also, sometimes, led him there.
In an ancient manuscript, containing an account of
the proceedings of the Bailiff's Court, at Stratford,
in the reigns of Philip and Mary, and Queen Eliza-
beth, I find a memorial of a suit instituted by him for
the small sum of four shillings \ John Shakspeare,

for John, the son of Thomas Shakspeare, was baptized there,
March 10, 1581-2.

Our poet's grandfather might, however, have been originally of
Ingon, in the parish of Hampton upon Avon, or as it was then
called, Bishop Hampton ; for a Henry Shakspeare (whether the
same person already mentioned, or another, does not appear,) lived
at one time in that parish, the register of which contains the fol-
lowing entries :

** 1582, June 10, Lettyce, the daughter of Henrye Shakespere,
was baptized,

*• 1585, Oct. 15, Jeames the sonne of Henrye Shakespere was
baptized.

** 1589, Oct. 25, Jeames Shakspeare of Yngon was buried."

Henry Shakspeare might have lived at one time at Snitterfield,
afterwards have moved to Ingon, and finally returned to Snitter-
field. Ingon is in the parish of Hampton, but nearer to Snitter-
field than Hampton. It is observable that Mr. John Shakspeare,
as we shall presently see, held a farm at Ingon ; to which he
might be attached either as the place of his nativity, or as being
in the neighbourhood of Snitterfield, if he was born there.

9 Though Great Wilmecote, in which Mr. Arden lived, is in the
parish of Aston Cantlow, Little Wilmecote, which adjoins it, is
in that of Stratford ; and this circumstance, together with its
vicinity to that town, for it is but two miles distant, necessarily
occasioned some intercourse between these places.

' " Stratford ") Cur. ibm. tent, vicesimo nono die Novembris,
Cur. / primo anno regni dnae nostrae Mariae, &c. [1553.]

THE LIFE OF

being, perhaps, originally of Snitterfield, which is but
two miles from Wilmecote, and three from Stratford,
found an easy introduction to his daughter; who,
after the death of her father, must necessarily, as one
of his executors, have had frequent occasion to visit
Stratford, for the purpose of settling his affairs, and
collecting such sums as were due to him at the
time of his death.

Robert Arden, our poet's maternal grandfather,
died in December, 1556 ; and his youngest daugh-
ter's marriage certainly took place in the following
year. Her portion, I find, from her father's will, was
a tract of land called Asbies, and the sum of six
pounds, thirteen shillings, and four-pence. Of this
land, I, for some time in vain, endeavoured to ascer-
tain the extent and value ; no trace of the denomina-
tion above-mentioned being, at present, to be found
at Wilmecote. But a bill in Chancery, which I dis-
covered in the Record Office, in the Tower, filed by
our poet's father, in November, 1597, against John
Lambert, son and heir of Edmond Lambert, of Bar-
ton on the Heath, in the county of Warwick, to
whom, in the year 1578, he had mortgaged the estate
which he acquired by his wife, has furnished me with
the precise amount of this property, the value of
which turns out to have been, within a few pounds,
what I had conjectured. It was an estate in fee ; and
according to the acknowledgment of the son of the
mortgagee in his answer, consisted of a messuage, one

Johes Dyckson fatet. accion. quern Robertus Arderne de Wyl-
mecot versus eum pros. sup. dem. iiijs. Id. fiat. leva, et concord,
in cur. quod pecunia pd. solut. fuerit citra prox. cur." Codex MS.
in Camera Stratforden.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

yard land ^ and four acres, in Wilmecote ; but, from
a fine levied by John and Mary Shakspeare, in
Easter Term, 1579 '\ it appears, more particularly,
that this estate consisted of Jift]/ acres of arable land,
two acres of meadow, four acres of pasture, and com-
mon of pasture for all manner of cattle ; the house
at Wilmecote being probably let for forty shillings
a-year (the usual rent of such a house at that time),
this estate, though mortgaged only for the sum of forty
pounds, may be estimated as fairly worth one hundred
and four pounds, supposing the land to have been let
at three shillings the acre, and the common rate of
purchase to have been at that time ten years ; each of
which suppositions I have reason to believe well
founded. The fortune, therefore, on the whole, of
Mary Arden, was, one hundred and ten pounds, thir-
teen shillings, and four-pence. Let not this moderate
portion be compared with the more ample fortunes of
the present age. At that time such a sum was con-
sidered a very good provision for a daughter, in a
sphere of life much superior to that of our poet's
mother. Mr. William Clopton, a man of the greatest
estate in the neighbourhood of Stratford, whose
manors comprehended several thousand acres, by his

* A yard land (virgata terrse), from the Saxon gi/rdland, varies
much in different counties ; in some containing twenty-five, in
others thirty, in others forty acres. The yard land here mentioned,
as will be shown hereafter, contained near fifty acres. In the
fields of Old Stratford, where our poet's estate lay, a yard land
contained only about twenty-seven acres.

3 F. levet in Term. Pasch. 20Eliz. in Officio Finium juxta Me-
dium Templum.

THE LIFE OF

will, made in January, 1559-60, only three years after
the period of which I am now treating, gave to his
eldest daughter but one hundred pounds, and to his
three younger daughters one hundred marks each,
that is, sixty-six pounds, thirteen shillings, and four-
pence I shall subjoin, in the Appendix, the will
of our poet's grandfather ^, which has furnished me

4 Will of William Clopton, proved in Feb. 1599-60. In Off.
Cur. Prerog.

5 Having taken a journey to Worcester with the hope of finding
this, and some other wills, that might throw a light on our au-
thor's history, I thought myself fortunate in meeting with the
information which has just now been submitted to my readers ;
but, according to a doctrine maintained in an anonymous work
[The Pursuits of Literature], I ought rather to make an apology
for taking up their time with such idle prible-prabbley worthy only
of Sir Hugh Evans or Master Slender. A modern poet, not
wholly without humour, among a great number of notes appended
to his verses, of which the object is not very apparent, unless it
were to show, that while he inveighs against the supposed folly
and absurdity of those who have attempted to illustrate our great
poet by their annotations, he can himself occasionally **out-
herod Herod," has the following sagacious remark : "When I speak
of rational men, it passes the bounds of all sagacity to divine by
what species of refined absurdity the xvills and testaments of actors
could be raked up and published to illustrate Shakspeare. (See
Malone's edit. vol. ii. p. 186, &c. &c.) A critick for such an in-
genious invention should be presented with the ahum Sagance ca-
liendrum, which would not easily fall from his head. — But Mr. M.
has redeemed this piece of folly by many valuable excellencies."

As in the course of the present work the reader will find several
similar jozece^ of folly (if this be one) it may not be improper to
say a word or two on this subject in limine ; and, after acknow-
ledging the courtesy of the concluding words above quoted, to ex-
amine how far the preceding charge is well founded.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

with several of these facts, and the inventory that ac-
companied it, as a curious exhibition of the furniture

It has been long since observed, that those who write should
read. If this judicious, though much neglected document had
been attended to by the writer of the paragraph above quoted, he
would not have fallen into the manifest error, I will not say the
refined absurdity, with which it is justly chargeable. He would
have learned, in the first place, that the wills which he alludes to,
were not raked up [i. e. discovered with infinite difficulty and
trouble], or published to illustrate Shalcspeare, but the History
of the Stagey and of the old actors who were fellow comedians with
our great poet, which it is humbly conceived they in some small
measure do ; the number of the testator's wives and children, the
fortune which he acquired by his profession, with various other
circumstances which are frequently furnished by his will, and the
time of his death, which is generally nearly ascertained by the pro-
bate, being, it is supposed, of some little consequence in the his-
tory of his life. He next would have learned, that though the
primary object of the publication of these wills was not, as he has
erroneously supposed, to illustrate Shakspeare, they do in fact il-
lustrate the works of this poet ; if furnishing the means of
ascertaining the genuine copy of an author's writings, and of dis-
tinguishing it from spurious and adulterated editions of them, de-
serves the name of illustration : he would have found from these
wills, that the two actors who were editors of the first complete
collection of our author's plays in folio, were dead before the end
of the year 1630, and thus he would have escaped the refined ab-
surdity of asserting that two dead men " corrected the spurious
edition of those plays in 1 632."

The truth, however, I believe, is, that when his satire was first
published, this writer was an humble candidate to be employed by
the booksellers of London, in continuing and completing some of
the great biographical works, which for many years past have been
given to the publick ; the editors of which, however diligent or
respectable, seem to have thought, with this anonymous rhymer,
that in biographical researches it is quite unnecessary to examine
a single manuscript in the British Museum, the Bodleian Library,
or any other curious repository. To open a parish register, or peruse

THE LIFE OF

and other effects of a gentleman of moderate fortune
in that age ^.

SECTION II.
From the loose language employed by Sir William
Dethick and Camden, in their grants of arms to
John Shakspeare, it might be supposed, and not with-
out some reason, that one of his ancestors had been in
the service of King Henry the Seventh, and had ob-
tained from that frugal monarch some profitable grant.

a tomb-stone or a will, they seem to have held, with him, an abo-
mination, and an invasion of the sacred rights of the dead : the ge-
nealogies of families preserved in the College of Heralds, the curious
notices furnished by the patent and clause rolls, by dormant privy
seals, by the Signet, Auditors, and Chirographer's Office, and by the
inquisitions taken post mortem, which, from the time of Richard the
Third, are preserved in the Chapel of the Rolls (as those an-
tecedent are in the Tower), appear to have been equally objects of
their aversion ; and the Record Office in the same ancient re-
pository, and the black-book in the Exchequer, they, without
doubt, concurred with him in considering as appropriated only to
the use of those who profess the black art, and are worthy of an
altum Sagance caliendrum. "Would you wish for better sympathy?"
From the specimen above given by this judicious and luell-in-
Jbrmed critick, it is manifest that he is admirably suited to the li-
terary employment to which he seems to have aspired : and by sub-
joining to the old inaccurate and imperfect lives of our illustrious
men, copious extracts from modern editions of their works (which
are in every one's hands), embellished with a few college jokes and
that kind of merriment Dr. Johnson has so pointedly described,
(Boswell's Life of Johnson, vol. i.) I have no doubt he will be able
very speedily to furnish his employers with a trim volume of bio-
graphy perfectly free from any ingenious invention^ without a single
will, or deed, or anecdote, or any curious or valuable information
whatsoever.

^ See the Appendix.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 29

In the confirmation of arms in 1596, this ancestor is
only said to have been advanced and rexvarded; but
in the subsequent confirmation, the nature of the be-
nefit is specifically mentioned, and we are told, that
he was r^ewar^ded " with lands and tenements gi\en to
him in those parts of Warwickshire where he and his
successors had continued, by some descents, in good
reputation and credit." If such a grant had been
made by King Henry the Seventh to an7/ of John
Shakspeare's lineal ancestors (for which of them was
in the contemplation of the heralds, whether his
grandfather, or a more remote progenitor, it is not
easy to ascertain^), the first question that may be
asked is, how came John Shakspeare, or at least some
one of his name, not to be in possession of those lands
when these armorial ensigns were a second time assigned
to him ? Supposing the lands and tenements thus
granted, to have been forfeited, or otherwise alienated,
by the family, yet still the original record of the do-
nation woidd not have been annihilated, but would
indubitably have appeared on the patent rolls ; and

7 The first grant of arms to John Shakspeare was made by
Robert Cooke, Clarencius, in 1569 or 1570; but it is not now
extant in the Herald's Office. A book of grants of arms made
by this herald to persons living in the county of Warwick, is,
however, probably somewhere extant, for it was formerly, as I
learn from one of Antony Wood's Manuscripts, in Ashmole's
Museum, in the possession of Ralph Sheldon, of Weston, in
Warwickshire, Esq.

Of the second grant made, by Sir William Dethick, in 1596,
there are two drafts in the Herald's Office, Vincent, 157, n. 23
and 24? ; the latter of which is much mutilated, a considerable
part of the sheet having been torn off. The more perfect of the
two may be found in the Appendix.

THE LIFE OF

no trace of it being there to be found, after a very
careful examination, in the Chapel of the Rolls, dur-
ing the whole reign of Henry the Seventh, it is abso-
lutely certain, that no such favour was ever conferred
by that King on any person of the name of Shak-
speare. The heralds, however, were not entirely
vmfounded in what they have asserted. It has already
been mentioned, that our poet's mother was the daugh-
ter of Mr. Robert Arden, of Wilmecote, near Strat-
ford; and I have no doubt, that one of his ancestors
was the person denoted by the vague words in ques-
tion, though the lands granted to him did not lie,
as they supposed, in the county of Warwick. In the
age of Queen Elizabeth, and indeed down to the
last century, it was customary (a custom not yet
wholly disused) to denominate by the same appella-
tion, relations equally near, whether the relationship
arose from consanguinity or affinity. Thus, John
Shakspeare, if he had occasion to speak of his wife's
grandfather, or great grandfather, would certainly
have called him his grandfather, or great grandfather ;
his wife's uncle, or even grand-uncle, he would have
called his uncle ; and a still more remote relation, the
wife of such grand-uncle, he would have called aunt.
Edward AUeyn, the player, constantly styles Philip
Henslowe his father, though he was not even his
step-father ^, being only second husband to the mo-
ther of AUeyn's wife. In like manner, Thomas
Nashe, who married Elizabeth Hall, our poet's grand-
daughter, calls Mrs. Hall, in his last will, his mother;
and if he had had occasion to speak of om* poet, he

^ He was only his wife's step-father.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

unquestionably would have called him his grand-
father ^, Viewing the assertion made by the heralds

9 So, also, Sir John Hubaud, of Idlicote, in Warwickshire, in his
will, made in 1583, constitutes his cousin George Digby, his brother
John Egeock, and his servant Richard Clark, his executors ; and
Edward Coombe, in 1597, makes Christopher Hales, who had mar-
ried his sister, and whom he calls his brother, one of his executors.
The SLppeWaUons, Jather-in-laxv, and 5ow-2;2-/atu, seldom occur in that
age. So fond were our ancestors of extending the circle of relations,
that they frequently considered a mere connection as a ground of
this kind of designation : thus Philip Henslowe was, in fact, no rela-
tion whatsoever of Edward Alleyn, though he constantly called
him son. Bishop Hall, in the Dedication of his Quo Vadis, in
1617, addressing Lord Denny, calls Lord Hay his noble son, in
consequence of his having married Lord Denny's daughter; and
Bayle, taking Hall's words in a literal sense, supposed Lord Denny
to be actually father to Lord Hay. See Gen. Diet. v. 716, note H.
So Lord Strafford, in 1637, writing to the mother of his first wife,
styles himself her obedient son (Straff. Lett. ii. 123): and our
author, in Julius Caesar, styles Cassius the brother of Brutus,
though, in truth, only his brother-in-law. The term, indeed, of
son-in-laiv, or brother-in-law, rarely occurs in that age. At a
subsequent period, Oliver Cromwell, and Waller, the poet, called
each other cousins, only because John Hampden was cousin to
them both.

With respect to the relations of a wife, the husband always ad-
dressed them, and spoke of them, as standing in the same degree
of relationship to him. Thus Thomas Killigrew dedicates his
play, entitled The Princess, to his dear niece the Lady Anne
Wentworth, who was in truth only his wife's niece.

It was the constant custom in old times, and the practice is not
wholly disused, for a nephew to call his great uncle, only uncle ;
and the wife's grandfather and grandmother were always considered
and called the grandfather and grandmother of the husband ;
with equal laxity, grandmothers denominated a grandson by the
nearer appellation of son. So Joan, Lady Abervagenny, in her
will in 1436, calls Sir James Ormond her son, though he was in
fact her grandson. From these usages it is clear, that the inter-

THE LIFE OF

in this light, all the difficulty vanishes ; for the father
of that Robert Arden, whose daughter John Shak-
speare married, or, in other words, the grandfather of
Mary Shakspeare, who, according to the usage above-
mentioned, was popularly called the grandfather of
John Shakspeare also, had been very highly distin-
guished and rewarded by King Henry the Seventh,
as the heralds rightly state the matter, in general
terms, in their first draft in 1596 \ Sir John Arden,

pretation given in the text, of the ambiguous words in the grant
of the heralds to our poet, is by no means fanciful or far-fetched.

I may add, that a similar error to that, which I believe has
prevailed for near a century, of supposing Shakspeare to be de-
scended from a paternal ancestor who had been rewarded with a
royal grant of lands, instead of a maternal one, has happened in
the case of Oliver Cromwell, who was thought by many to
be descended from Cromwell, Earl of Essex ; because forsooth
his 'wife was descended from a nobleman with that title ; not
indeed Thomas Cromwell, but William Bourchier, Earl of Essex .
See Dugdale's Bar. ii. 132.

» In their subsequent grant, indeed, in 1599, they have deviated
from their original statement, and added that he was rewarded
with a grant of lands in Warwickshire, which we shall presently
see was not the fact. But this slight inaccuracy in the latter in-
strument cannot affect the present hypothesis, when we recollect,
that, after having rightly stated, in the grant of 1596, the degree
of his relationship to John Shakspeare {grandfather) y his son's
place of residence, *' Wilmecote," and his grand-daughter's
Christian name (Mary), they, in two of these particulars in their
grant of 1599, are inaccurate ; and the third, they have wholly
omitted. I may add, that grants of lands in Warwickshire having
been made by King Henry the Eighth to the elder branch of
Robert Arden's family (see p. 38, n. 9), the heralds being in-
structed that Henry the Seventh had been equally liberal to one
of the younger branches, might have taken it for granted that the
lands conferred on him were in that county, where his family had

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

the elder brother of our Robert's grandfather, was
Squire for the body to that king ^ ; the duty of which

long resided ; and as they express it, ** had continued by some
descents in good reputation and credit." Heralds, when once they
were satisfied that there was a sufficient ground for granting the
arms which were claimed, were not very rigid in examining into
the title-deeds of men's estates.

^ Dugdale's Antiq. of Warwickshire, p. 653, edit. 1656. For
this assertion he only quotes Holgrave, qu. 19, by which is meant
the nineteenth quire of the book so denominated in the Prerogative
Office ; but in that quire there is no will of any person of the
name of Arden. I suppose, therefore, that in the will of some
other person contained in the quire cited. Sir John Arden is men-
tioned (probably as one of the feoffees in some feofment), and
is described as Squire for the body to King Henry the Seventh;
but the laxity of this reference prevents me from furnishing my
readers with the words alluded to by Dugdale. A passage, how-
ever, in Sir John Arden's will, which is in the Prerogative
Office (Parch, qu.8), proves that he was frequently honoured by
the visits of the King, whom he probably attended in Bosworth
field. By his will, which was made on the 4th of June, 1526
(not 1525, as Dugdale has it), he gives to his son Thomas, as
** heire lomys and to remayne in the maner of the Loge from
heire to heire, a standing cup with a cover well gilt, and the
best salt with a cover." He likewise bequeaths to him a paire
of swannys, breedyng in the mote; a great pott with a great paire
of gobbards ; a great broch ; a paire of andyrons for the hall ; a
folding table with the kerven cupbord ; the hedde hi the king's
chamber uoith all that helongeth of the best, uoith a hanging of the
samey rede and grene." To his son John, " a gowne furred with
foye, a blak gowne furred with booge, a blak velvet doublet;"
his " best hose, the secunde salt with a cover, the secunde
wayne, tv/o oxen, an oxe-harrowe, with the hole tynys, two can-
dlesticks, a better and a worse." To his wife Elizabeth, " all
the goods that she brought, both here and at the Holt." Of his
brother Robert, who is one of the witnesses to his will, he thus
speaks : " Item, I will that my brothers, Thomas, Martin, and
VOL. II. D

34 THE LIFE OF

office, requiring a personal attendance on his sovereign
both by day and night, accompanied with a constant
famiHar intercourse ^, he necessarily had frequent op-
Robert, have their fees during their lives." This will was proved,
June 27, 1526 ; and it appears from the Office found after the
death of the testator, that he died on the day on which his will
was made. Esc. 18 Hen. VIII. p. 1, n. 9. Dugdale was unac-
quainted with the exact time of his death.

3 See a manuscript in the Herald's Office, M. 7, entitled " The
Services of Divers Officers of the Courte," one part of which was
written in the time of King Henry VII. another in the 13th
year of Henry VIII.

** As for the Squyers for the body^ they ought to aray the kyng
and unaray, and no man else to sett hand on the kyng, and the
yeman or grome of the robes to take to the Squyer for the body
all the kyngs stuffe, as well his shone as his other gere.
And the Squyer for the body to draw theym on. And the
Squyer for the body aught to take the charge of the cupborde
for all nyght ; and if please the kyng to have a palett abowt his
traverse for all night, there must be two Squyers for the body, or
ells one knyght for the body; or els to lye in their owne chambers.
And the usher must kepe the chamber dore untill the kyng be in
bedd : and to be thereat on the morowe at the kyngs uprysyng :
and the usher must see that the watche be sett, and to know of
the kyng where they shall watche." P. 33, verso.

" Item, a Squyer for the body or gentleman huisher owght to
sett the kyngs sworde at his bedd hed.

*' Item, a Squyer for the body owght to charge a secret grome or
page to have the kepyng of the said bedd, with a light until the
tyme the kyng be disposed to go unto hit." Ibid. p. 20, verso.

*' At dinner (says a late writer on the nature and duty of this
office), there was another office to be performed by the esquire ;
for the ordinances of King Henry VII. tell us, that one of the
esquires of the body is to be ready and obedient at dinner and
supper, to serve the king of his pottage at such time as he shall
be commanded by the sewer and gentleman usher.

Though we have now left the king in his privy chamber, and
jn the hands of the servants of that department, yet we must not

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

portunities of ingratiating himself with his master,
and a ready access to the royal favour. He died

entirely dismiss the esquire ; for Sir H. Spelman says, that when
the king went out, the office of the esquire was to follow him and
carry the cloak.

Thus much for the office of the esquire of the body by day ;
but the principal, most essential, and most honourable part of his
duty was at night ; for when the king retired to bed, the esquire
had the concentrated power of the gentleman ushers, the vice
chamberlain, and lord chamberlain, in himself ; having the abso-
lute command of the house both above and below stairs. At
this period [the reign of King Henry VIII.], and till the close of
the last century, the royal apartments, from the bedchamber to
the guard-chamber inclusively, were occupied in the night by
one or more of the servants belonging to each chamber respec-
tively. The principal officer, then the gentleman, now the lord
of the bedchamber, slept in a pallet bed in the same room with
the king; and in the ante-room between the privy chamber and
the bedchamber (in the reign of King Charles II. at least) slept
the groom of the bedchamber. In the privy chamber next ad-
joining, slept two of the six gentlemen of the privy chamber in
waiting ; and in the presence chamber, the esquire of the body
on a pallet bed, upon the haut pas, under the cloth of estate;
while one of the pages of the presence chamber slept in the same
room, without the verge of the canopy, not far from the door.
All these temporary beds were put up at night, and displaced in
the morning, by the officers of a particular branch of the ward-
robe, called the wardrobe of beds.

" After supper, previous to the king's retiring to his bed-
chamber, the proper officers were to see all things furnished for
the night, some for the king's bedchamber, and others for the
king's cup-board, which was sometimes in the privy chamber,
and sometimes in the presence chamber, at the royal pleasure,
and furnished with refections for the king's refreshment, if called
for. After this, the officers of the day retired, and committed all
to the charge of the esquire of the body. This domestick cere-
mony was called the Order of All Night]; the nature of which I
shall now give at large from an account preserved in the Lord

D 2

THE LIFE OF

June 4, 1526, in the eighteenth year of the reign of
King Henry the Eighth. Of his five brothers, we
are only concerned with Robert, who was living in
1526, being a witness to John's will. I find by an
inquisition taken after the death of Sir John Arden,
that his eldest son, Thomas, was then forty years old,
and upwards ^ ; and consequently he must have been
born in or before the year 1484. His father indeed
was married eleven years before, but probably when
he was not above eighteen, his wife's father having,
for the sake of his fortune, inveigled him into a mar-
riage in his minority, a practice at that time extremely
common. If we suppose Sir John Arden's brother,
Robert (who must have been near three years younger
than he, two other children having intervened between
them), to have married in 1484, he might have been,
and probably was, the father of that Robert Arden,
of whom neither Dugdale, nor any of our other antiqua-
ries, seem to have had any knowledge ; who was groom
or page of the bedchamber to King Henry the Seventh;

Chamberlain's Office. The writer, who was himself an esquire
of the body to two successive kings, goes circumstantially through
the whole of the esquire's business of the night ; from whence it
will appear, that even so lately as the middle of the last century,
the office was of so confidential a nature, that no despatch,
letter, or message, could be communicated to the king in the
night, but what was brought to the esquire on duty, and by him
carried iri propria persona to the king."

For a more particular account of this ancient office, which
finally expired in the time of King William (1694^), and the
ceremony called the Order of All Night, see Curialiae, or an
Historical Account of some Branches of the Royal Household, by
Samuel Pegge, Esq. Part I. to. 1782.

4 Esc. 18 Hen. VIII. p. 1, n. 97.
5

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

and appears to have been a favourite of his sovereign,
having been highly distinguished and rewarded by him.
In the seventeenth year of his reign (Feb. 22, 1502),
perhaps by the interest of Sir John his uncle, who, it
may be supposed, placed him about the King \ he was
constituted keeper of the royal park called Aldercar ^ ;
and in the following September, bailiff of the lord-
ship of Codnore, and keeper of the park there.
About five years afterwards, in September, 1507, two
years before the King's death, at which time, having
probably attained his twenty-second year, he is no
longer styled umis garcionum camercE, he obtained a
lease from the crown of the manor of Yoxsall, in the
county of Stafford, for twenty-one years ; which,

■5 That Robert, the nephew of Sir John Arden, was placed ii^
this situation originally by the favour of his uncle, is extremely
probable, from the nature of the duty of a groom or page of the
King's chamber, who attended on certain occasions on the squire
for the body, as that officer did on the King. See a manuscript
in the Herald's Office, already quoted, M. 7, p. 19:

" The Rome and service belonging to a Page of the kyngs
Chamber to doo.

•* Item, the said Facets at nyght, at season convenyent, must
make the payletts for knyghts and squyers for the body, in suche
a chamber as they shalbe appoynted unto.

Item, the said pageis shall doo make redy the'said knyghts and
Squyers for the body, and bere theyr gere to the kyngs great
chamber at the instaunce of the said knyghts and squyers to
their servaunts: And the said pageis to receive of the said knyghts
and squyers servaunts such nyght gere as they shall delyver theym
for their said maistres. Thus don, the said pageis to make sure
the fyers and lights in every chamber, and so to make their
paylet at the chamber dore where the said knyghts and Squyer«:
do lye."

^ See Appendix. 7 See Appendix.

THE LIFE OF

were we obliged to rely on conjecture only, might be
presumed to have been a very valuable grant, as the
annual rent stipulated to be paid to the King was
forty-two pounds, a considerable sum at that time ;
which yet had certainly a very small relation to the
real yearly value of the manor. Concerning its extent
and value, however, I am not under the necessity of
having recourse to conjecture ; for by an inquisition
taken many years afterwards, in the thirty-third year
of Queen Elizabeth (1591), it appears that this manor
contained above four thousand six hundred acres ^.
As Thomas Arden ^, cousin-german to Robert, the

^ By an inquisition taken October 4, 33 Eliz. [1591], after
the death of Sir William Holies, who died at Haughton, in the
county of Nottingham, on the 26th of the preceding Januaiy, it
was found, that he died possessed {inter alia) of the manor of
Yoxall, with all its appurtenances, in the county of Stafford,
comprising forty messuages, twenty cottages, one water-mill, two
pigeon-houses, forty gardens, forty orchards, two thousand three
hundred acres of meadow, one thousand acres of pasture, one
hundred acres of wood, forty acres of furze and heath, two hun-
dred acres of marsh, with a rent of ten pounds a year ; and that
the whole manor was worth annually forty pounds and ten-pence
[the rent reserved to the crown in the grant under which Sir
William Holies held]. Esc. 33 Eliz. p. 1, n. 122.

9 Beside the distinction which was shown by King Henry the
Seventh to Sir John Arden, who, we have seen, was one of the
squires for his body, and the lucrative grant to our poet's great
grandfather, Robert Arden, the groom of the chamber ; it should
be noticed that Thomas Arden, the eldest son of Sir John, and
cousin-german of Robert, obtained a grant of the manor of
Brerewood Hall, and the rectory of Curdworth, in the county of
Warwick (Esc. 5 Eliz. p. 1, n. 2) ; and though this grant was
made by Henry the Eighth in the thirty-first year of his reign

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 39

groom of the bedchamber, and nearly of the same age,
married in the year 1508, we may reasonably suppose
that Robert also became a father about that time,
perhaps in 1510, when he appears to have been twenty-
five years old ; and if his son Robert, the father of our
poet's mother, who settled at Wilmecote, near Strat-
ford, married Agnes Webbe in 1535, at the age of
twenty-four, then his fourth daughter, Mary, was pro-
bably born in 1539? and was about eighteen years old
in 1557, when she became the wife of John Shak-
speare. In tracing these descents, I have been the
more minute, because they are wholly omitted by
Dugdale in his pedigree of the Arden family, in
which he has mentioned the first Robert, brother to
Sir John, without noticing any of his posterity : an
omission for which he is not answerable ; for to have
enumerated all the minor branches of each family, and
their pedigree, would have been needless labour.
For the existence of all the persons above-mentioned,
as our poet's maternal ancestors, I have unquestionable
authority; for the progress of their respective descents,
conjecture only ; but conjecture strongly confirmed by
the corresponding marriages and deaths of the colla-
teral branches of this family, as may appear by in-
specting the genealogical table inserted in the Appen-
dix. From that table it may be seen, that our poet's
maternal grandfather, whose will has been already
noticed, was cousin-german to William Arden, heir
apparent to Thomas, the owner of the great estate of

(1539), it also might have been in the contemplation of the
heralds, or rather of those from whom they received their in-
structions, who might not have minutely attended to the date.

THE LIFE OF

Park Hall and Curdworth ; which William died in
June, 1544 ; and that our poet's mother, Mary Shak-
speare, was third cousin to Edward Arden, who be-
came possessed of that estate in 1563, was Sheriff of
the county of Warwick in 1568, and by the artifices
of Robert Earl of Leicester was attainted and exe-
cuted in 1584 \ Leland, who composed his Itinerary
between the years 1536 and 1542, mentions that
Arden of the court was a younger brother to Arden
the heir ^. The principal representative of the Arden
family, in Leland's time, was Thomas Arden, already
noticed, who succeeded to his father's estate in 1526,
and died in 1561. His only brother, John, was not, as
far as I have been able to learn, preferred at court.
The person about the court was probably either
Robert, the quondam groom of the chamber, who,
when Leland wrote, was above fifty years of age, and
having once set his foot on the ladder of promotion,
in the time of Henry the Seventh, might have conti-
nued to ascend it in the reign of his successor ; or his
son Robert, our poet's maternal grandfather, who was
then, I believe, about twenty-seven or twenty-eight
years old. In the multitude of facts and places no-
ticed by Leland, he might easily have mistaken the
younger branch, for the younger brother of this fa-
mily. Supposing, however, the historian to have been
perfectly correct, and that John Arden, the brother of
Thomas, was the person in his contemplation, that

' An account of the extremely hard usage which this gentleman
received from Leicester, may be found in Peck's Desid. Cur.
4to. p. 579.

* Itin. vi. 20.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 41

circumstance would not at all militate against the
present hypothesis.

As the concession of arms obtained from the Col-
lege of Heralds, by John Shakspeare, in 1569 or
1570, entitled his son to the honourable distinction of
armorial ensigns, a privilege which, however little es-
timated at present, was in that age considered as very
valuable and important, it may appear strange, that
our poet (for the application, without doubt, came from
him, though his father's name was used) should at a
subsequent period, near thirty years afterwards, again
apply to them on the same subject. The solution, I
think, is, that, finding himself now rising into conse-
quence (which w^e shall hereafter see was the case),
and having acquired some wealth, he wished to derive
honour to himself and his posterity, in consequence of
his descent from the ancient and opulent house of
Arden. Hence that descent is carefully noticed in
the draft of 1596 ; and, to enable him and his poste-
rity to impale the arms of Arden with his own, seems
to have been the principal object of that confirma-
tion ^, or exemplification of arms, which was granted
by Camden and Sir Y/illiam Dethick, in 1599 : cir-
cumstances which appear to me to add great strength
to the interpretation of the ambiguous words in these
grants, which has been already given.

3 These arms have not hitherto been discovered thus impaled ;
they might, notwithstanding, have been thus impaled in a ring or
seal used by our poet, and now lost ; or this might have been his
object in 1596 and 1599, and that object have been afterwards
neglected.

THE LIFE OF

SECTION III.

The town of Stratford upon Avon having, as Dug-
dale observes, had the good fortune to give birth and
sepulture to our great dramatick poet, and his father
having been a member of the corporation, and attained
to the highest honours which it can confer, it may not
be improper, before we proceed further, to take a tran-
sient view of its history and constitution.

Stratford, or Stretford as it was anciently called,
deriving its name from the ford^ or passage there,
over the Avon, on the great street or road, leading
from Henley in Arden to London, can boast a very
* high antiquity ; being mentioned in a charter of
Egwin Bishop of Worcester, to whom it belonged,
above three hundred years before the Norman inva-
sion ^. It continued to be possessed by the Bishops
of Worcester, who had formerly a palace there and
under whom a court leet was held there twice
a-year ^, till it was passed away by Nicholas Heath,

3 Dugdale's Antiq. of Warwicksh. p. 4-75, edit. \ Q5Q.

4 " Necnon de uno burgagio jacen. in strata vocat. Church
strete in Stratford predict, in quo Johes Ashurste modo inhabitat
uno capite inde abuttan. versus Episcopum JVigorn. ex parte
occidentali, et alio capite inde abuttan. versus Johem Hubaude
ex partie orientali : necnon de alio burgagio jacen. in Church
strete, in quo Johes Boleyn modo inhabitat, "uno capite inde
abuttan. versus Dom. Episcopum JVigorn. ex parte occidentali,
et alio capite inde abuttan. versus viam regiam vocat. Church
Strete." Esc. 13 Hen. VHI. p. unica, n. UO.

5 This appears from a loose paper which I found in the chamber
of Stratford, containing the proceedings of a court leet in the
time of Henry VHI.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

Bishop of that diocese, in the third year of King Ed-
ward the Sixth [1549], to John Dudley, Earl of
Warwick (afterwards Duke of Northumberland^),
who in the same year parted with it to the King, for
certain lands in Oxfordshire ^, and by another ex-
change recovered it again, in the seventh year of the
same King's reign ^. On the attainder of the Duke
of Northumberland (1 Mary, 1554), this town, by the
name of the manor of Old Stratford, was granted by
the Queen, to Joan his duchess ^ ; but in the third and
fourth year of Philip and Mary, as Dugdale has ob-
served, a new grant of it was made (Nov. 10, 1556) to
the hospital of the Savoy in the suburbs of London \
The learned, and generally most accurate writer
above-mentioned, has not traced the property of this
manor further : but if he had looked a little lower on
the same roll, he would have found that this grant to
the hospital of the Savoy (which had been founded
by King Henry the Seventh ; afterwards, with other
eleemosynary institutions, dissolved by his son ; and
again re-established by letters patent, dated 3 Nov.
3 and 4 Ph. and Mary), he would have found, I say,
that this grant, made seven days after the re-establish-
ment of that hospital, was vacated in the following
year, the Master and Chaplains of the Savoy on the

" Stratf. Cur. vis fran. pleg. cum cur. dni JohsgraciaDei Episc.
Wigorn. ibid. tent, quarto die mensis Octobris anno regni Hen-
rici octavi, &c. tricesimo tertio," [1542], &c.

^ Pat. 3 Ed. VI. p. 3. 7 Ibid. p. 9.

8 Pat. 7 Ed. VI. p. 8. 9 Pat. 1 Mar. p. 5.

» 3 & 4' Ph. & Mar. p. 12.

THE LIFE OF

l^th of May, 1557 (4 and 5 Philip and Mary), hav-
ing come into Chancery and surrendered the said
letters patent ; and accordingly the grant was can-
celled on the roll. In the year 1562 (April 6), this
manor, with all its rights, members, and appurte-
nances, was granted by Queen Elizabeth to Ambrose
Dudley, Earl of Warwick (eldest son of the late
John, Duke of Northumberland), and the heirs male
of his body, and for want of such issue, to his brother
Robert Dudley (afterwards Earl of Leicester), and
the heirs male of his body. By these letters patent,
also, the site and capital mansion of the late college
of Stratford (of which institution some account will be
given hereafter) was granted to the Earl of Warwick,
together with all houses, edifices, barns, stables, dove-
houses, orchards, &c. within the circuit and precincts
of the same site, or thereto appertaining (then, or
late in the occupation of John Combes), late parcel of
the possessions of the late aforesaid Duke of Northum-
berland^. The Earl of Warwick, who was one of
the most amiable and respected characters of that age,
and a perfect contrast to his brother, the Earl of Lei-
cester, dying in Feb. 1589-90, without issue, and his
brother, who deceased about eighteen months before,
having also died without lawful issue, a new grant
of this manor in fee was made 33 Eliz. (Jan. 27,
1590-91), to Henry Best and John \¥ells ^ who
afterwards sold it to Lodowick, the father of Sir Ed-
ward Grevil, of Milcot, knight, from whom it was pur-
chased, some time, as I imagine, between the years

^ Pat. i Eliz. p. 4.

3 Pat. 33 Eliz. p. 3.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

1620 and 1630, by Lionel Cranfield, Earl of Middle-
sex, ancestor of the present Duke of Dorset, in whose
possession it remains at this day.

Of the college above-mentioned it is only necessary
to say here, that John de Stratford, a native of
this town, and Bishop of Winchester, in the fifth year
of King Edward III. founded a chantry, consisting
of five priests, one of whom was warden, in a certain
aisle or chapel of the church of Stratford, on the south
side, dedicated to St. Thomas the Martyr ; and, for
their support and maintenance, endowed it with lands
and tenements, which, with the accession of subse-
quent benefactions, were valued in a survey made in
37 Henry VIII. at 127L ISs. 9d, per annum 1 In
addition to the original foundation in the seventh year
of Henry VIII. [1514,] Ralph Collingwode instituted
four children choristers, to be daily assistant in the
celebration of Divine service. This chantry, says
Dugdale, soon after its foundation, was known by the
name of the college of Stratford ^. For the more

4 From the following extract from the Court of Augmentations
made by Mr. Thomas Greene, formerly town-clerk of Stratford,
their revenues do not appear to have been adequate to their ex-
penditure.

*' The College 1 Founded by John Stretford for a Warden,
of Stretford. J 5 preests, and 4 choristers, and endowed
with other lands by CoUingwood, value 127/. I8s. 9d.

" Resolut. 205. Sd. In annuities & fees 13/. In stipends to
divers ministers, videlicet to the Warden for his Stipend yerely,
68/. 5s. 2d, to other ministers for their stipend & dyet,
64-/. 185. Sd. Sum 147/. 4.9. Rem'. Nill. quia in surplusag.
19/. 5s. Sd."

^ Antiq. of Warwicksh. p. 482. Any small foundation for a

THE LIFE OF

commodious habitation of the priests, a large house of
square stone ^ was built by Ralph de Stratford, Bishop
of London, in the 26th year of Edward III. which, on
the suppression of religious houses (37 Henry VIII.),
being vested in the crown, was granted by Edward
the Sixth to John Dudley, Earl of Warwick, and
afterwards, as we have seen, by Elizabeth, to his son.
How the crown was enabled, while that nobleman
was yet living, to make a lease of this college, with
all its appurtenances, for twenty-one years, to Richard
Coningsby, his executors and assigns, 13th Dec. 17
Eliz. [1574], which was surrendered in the following
year, and a new grant made to him for the same

select number of priests and choristers, was formerly called a
college, according to the maxim of the civil law, *' tres Jaciunt
collegium.'" So in Leland's Itin. iv. 165, a: ** On the north
syde of S'. James [in Warwick] is a pretty Colledge, havinge a
4 preists that sing in S'. James Chappell, and they belonge to a
fraternity of our lady and S'. George." — Again, ibid. The sub-
urbe withoute the west gate is called the West end — There was
a Colledge of Blacke Frires in the north part of this suburbe."
Again : '* There is a suburbe in the north syde of Warwike, and
therein is the chapell of S'. Michaell, where sometyme was a
College et confratres ; but now it is taken as a free chapell."

^ " The church of Stratford now standinge, as it is supposed,
was renewed in building by John de Stratford, Archbishop of
Canterbury, in the begining of the raigne of K. E. 3, whoe
was borne at Stratforde, whereof he tooke his name. He made
this of a simple paroche church ?i collegiate church, augmenting
it with some landes.

" There be belonginge to the Colledge 4 preists, 3 clarkes, 4
choristers, and there mansion house is an ancient peice of worke
of square stone, hard by the cemitarye. The church is dedicated
to the Trinitye." Itiri. iv. p. 1, fol. 167, a.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

term \ reserving a rent of 64/. Ss, 4<d. I have not been
able to discover.

So early as the time of King Richard the First, the
burgesses of Stratford are mentioned ^ ; and the town,
I believe, v^as for a long time governed by wardens,
or bailiffs, chosen from among them ^. It is certain,
that during the reign of King Henry the Eighth,
wardens were annually chosen, to keep the great
bridge of Stratford in repair ^ ; and in the time of Ed-
ward the Fourth, they had a steward or town-clerk ^.
The town, however, was not incorporated till the se-
venth year of the reign of Edward the Sixth ; who
signed the charter of incorporation on the 28th of
June, 1553, eight days only before his death ^. By
this charter the principal inhabitants were incorpo-
rated by the name of the bailiff and burgesses of
Stratford upon Avon, and the corporation was ap-
pointed to consist of fourteen aldermen^ one of whom
was to be elected annually to the office of bailiff, and
of fourteen burgesses. The first bailiff named in
the charter was Thomas Gilbert ^ whose trade is not

y Pat. 18 Eliz. p. 12.
^ Dugdale's Antiq. of Warwicksh. p. 4?76,
9 The bailiffs of Stratford are mentioned in a patent, 5 Ed. IIL
p. 3, m.lO.

' This bridge, consisting of fourteen arches, was built by Sir
Hugh Clopton, Knight, in the time of Henry the Seventh.

* Thomas Throckmorton, Esq''% Steward of Stratford, was ad-
mitted into the Guild of S'. Mary, 9 Ed. IV. 1469. Registr.
Gild. fol. 92, a.

3 The warrant for the grant of this charter is inserted in the
Appendix.

4 The other aldermen named in the original charter, were
Richard Lord, Hugh Reynolds, William Smythe, Thomas Phi-

THE LIFE OF

mentioned in that instrument, but who, I find from
other docum.ents, was a dyer. For their better main-
tenance and support, all the lands and possessions of
the gild of the Holy Cross (an amicable and chari-
table fraternity, which had subsisted at least from the
time of Edward the Third [1327], and had been dis-
solved in the first year of the reign of Edward the
Sixth, excepting only a single house called the Man-
sion House of the Guild), were granted to the alder-
men and burgesses, expressly, however, on condition
that they should continue and maintain the alms-
house, for twenty-four decayed inhabitants of the
town, and the grammar school for the education of
youth, as they had been maintained by the late guild ;
and that they should pay the master of the school a
stipend of twenty pounds a-year. All the tithes of
hay and corn in Old Stratford, Welcome, and Bishop-
ton, which had belonged to the lately dissolved college
of Stratford, being likewise granted by this charter,
the aldermen and burgesses were very properly re-
quired to pay the vicar an annual salary, which at
that time was no more than twenty povmds, and forty
shillings to enable him to pay his tenths and first

lippes, Thomas Wynfeeld, John Jefferies, Thomas Dixon, George
Whatley, Henry Biddle, William VVhatley, Robert Mors, Robert
Pratt, and Adrian Quiney.

The original burgesses are not named in the charter ; but from
another instrument in the archives of Stratford, I find that about
two years afterwards (April 20, 1555), the burgesses were, then,
John Burbadge, William Mynsker, Daniel Phillips, Robert Perrot,
Laurence Peynton, Roger Sadler, Humphry Plymley, Richard
Harrington, William Smithy corvizar, Francis Harbadge, George
Turnor, Richard Symmonds, John Wheler, and Lewis ap Wil-
liams.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 49<

fruits. In addition to the grant of a common seal, a
weekly market, and two annual fairs, the bailiff was
invested with the powers of escheator, coroner, al-
moner, and clerk of the market, and authorized to
hold a court of record, every fortnight, for the trial
of all causes within the jurisdiction of the borough, in
which the debt and damages did not amount to thirty
pounds ^. The whole revenues of the guild of the
Holy Cross, which were granted by this charter, pro-
duced at that time only forty-six pounds, three shil-
lings, and two-pence halfpenny^. In addition to
which his Majesty gave the borough, by the same
charter, the tithes of all the lands which had be-
longed to the late dissolved college, which were let
for 34/. per annum.

SECTION IV.

John Shakspeare, wherever he may have been born,
settled in Stratford not very long after the year 1550 ;

5 Pat. 7 Ed. VI. p. 13.

^ Antecedent to this grant, the revenues of the borough of
Stratford appear to have been extremely small : for in the earliest
rent-roll of the borough, which I have found, after the grant of
this charter, that for the year 1563, their whole revenue, exclu-
sive of the tithes of the late college, amounted only to 521. Os. Id.

The personal property of the guild, about seventy years before
its dissolution, is ascertained by the curious inventory, which, being
too long for this place, may be found in the Appendix. The
guild, it should be observed, was governed by eight aldermen,
chosen annually out of their own body, and a master, who was
also elected annually, by the aldermen. The master, together
with two proctors, elected by him and the aldermen, had the
entire management of the lands and revenues of the guild. The
famous lawyer, Littleton, was admitted a member of this frater-
nity in 1479, 19 Ed. IV. Registr. Gild. fol. 110, b.
A^OL. II. E

THE LIFE OF

for in the middle of the year 1555 a suit was instituted
against him, in the baiHff's court, which, for another
purpose, I shall hereafter have more particular occa-
sion to mention. He was, as I conjecture, born in or
before the year 1530 ^ From Mr. Arden's will,
made in Dec. 1556, there is ground to believe that his
daughter Mary was then single. She must have
married our poet's father in the following year; for in
Sept. 1558, she brought him a daughter, named Joan,
who died in her infancy.

In consequence of misinformation obtained at Strat-
ford, as it should seem, by Mr. Betterton, in the early
part of the last century, and communicated by him to
Mr. Rowe, originating probably in too hasty an in-
spection of the register of that parish, we have been
told, — and the tale, together with the few other facts
recorded by the same writer, has been transmitted from
book to book, — that our poet's father " had so large a

7 He was chosen a burgess of Stratford about the same time as
John Tayler, a shearman or cloth-worker of that town, and
served with him the office of chamberlain in the year 1562. It is
not unreasonable, therefore, to suppose them to have been nearly
of the same age.

In the register of the proceedings of the corporation in the
Council Chamber, 30 June, 34 Eliz. (1592), Mr. Tayler is called
old John Tayler ; and in the account of Henry Wilson, Cham-
berlain, made 24 January, 34< Eliz. (1593-4), he is denomi-
nated Father Tayler : " Receaved of Father Tayler for Michael
Shakleton, iij*. iiijf/." This was then, as now, in the country, a
common appellation for old men. So, in another account made
by George Badger for the year 1596 : " Item, Receaved of
Father Degge for his entrance into the Almshouse, vi*. \md"
So also in the register of the parish of Stiatford, I find among
the burials in 1587, March 23, Jone, wife to Father Bell of
Bishopton."

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

family, ten children in all (according to Mr. Rowe's
theory, he should have said eleven), that, though he was
his eldest son, he could give him no hetter education
than his own employment ^. The truth, however, is,
that our poet's mother never appears to have borne to
her husband more than eight children. Jive of whom
only, namely, four sons and one daughter, attained to
years of maturity; William, Gilbert, Richard, Ed-
mond, and Joan (on each of whom I shall have occa-
sion to speak hereafter) ; Margaret, Anne, and an elder
Joan, having died in their infancy ^. Instead, there-
fore, of being charged with the maintenance of so
numerous a family as ten children, the father of our
poet had only half that number for any considerable
period to support.

The principal cause of the confusion and error in
which this subject has been involved, was the supposal
that Ursula, Humphrey, and Philip Shakspeare, who
were baptized at Stratford, between March, 1588-9,
and Sept. 1591 (at the former of which periods, John
and Mary Shakspeare had been more than thirty

* Rowe's Life of Shakspeare.

9 Joan, the eldest daughter of John Shakspeare, was baptized
at Stratford on September 15, 1558 ; and though her burial is not
recorded in the register (perhaps from her dying in some other
place), she probably died before April, 1569, under nine years of
age ; because another daughter was then baptized by the same
name. Although parents sometimes gave the same Christian
name to two children living at the same time, the other circum-
stances attending this child, render it improbable that should
have been the case in this instance. Margaret Shakspeare was
baptized Dec. 2, 1562, and was buried April 13, 1563 ; and
Anne was baptized Sept. 28, 1571, and was buried April 4, 1579.

I'M

THE LIFE OF

years married), were the children of our poet's father;
whereas they were, in fact, the children of another
person of the same Christian and surname, who then
lived in that town, and was of the humble occupation
of a shoemaker \ In consequence of this erroneous
notion, our poet's father has been supposed to have

* " Stratford "» Ad aulam ibid. tent. xxix° die Marcii, A", regni

Burgus. dnae nostras Elizabethae, &c. xxiv". [1592] :
" A Note of M'. Okers money, and to whom yt is lent; and the
names of their sureties, and also of Bakers money.
Bakers Money.

" Thomes Fourde, Shoemaker, v". for P. and Henrie Rogers,
butcher, and John Shaxspere, shuemaJcer, his suerties.
" Okers Money.

" Philippus Grene in x''. for v''. Henrie Rogers, butcher, and
John Shaxspere, shuemakery his suerties.

" John Fisher, shuemaker, in x". for v". and Humphrey Wheler,
and Humphrey Cowper, shoemakers^ his suerties.

** Ad aulam ibid. tent. xxx". die Junii, a". 1592 :

" At this Hall John Shackspere, Master of the companie of
Shuemakers, paid to the same Henrie Wilson^ the moitie of
Richard Fletcher the sadler his freedome, xx% which saied xx*. is
due to the chamber, and so paied."

On the 6th day of Sept. 1586, " George Badger, Roger
Welshe, John Shaxspere and Humphry Brace, were elected
constables for the ensuing year, and John Shaxspere and Hum-
phrey Brace were sworn." These two persons again served the
same office in the following year, together with Edward Bushell
and David Jones. Humphrey Brace was a grocer and mercer at
Stratford, and died possessed of a good property in the year
1591-2, as appears by his will, which is in the Prerogative Office.

" Burgus ~) At a Hall there holden the xvii"". dale of Fe-

Stratford. / bruarie, anno 1590" Thomas Okers money

was delivered to the persons whose names are underwritten.

" John Shaxspere v". his sureties Richard Sponer and Robert
Yonge." Registr. Burg. Stratford. A.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

married three wives, though he never had more than
one ; and the Christian name of his wife, as well as the
time of her death, have heen hitherto unascertained.

If the parish register of Stratford had been care-
fully attended to, it might have been observed, that
the father of our poet, antecedent to his holding the
respectable office of bailiff, is always denominated by
his Christian name, without any honourable distinction
or addition ; and his children, whether their baptisms
or deaths are recorded, are mentioned only as the chil-
dren of plain " John Shakspere." Subsequently to
that period, that is, from the year 1569, they are in-
variably described as the children of Mr. John Shak-
spere [filius aut filia Magistri Shakspere]; and so,
from that time, their father (as every other bailiff) is
always entitled, in all the records of the proceedings
of the corporation, which I have examined with this
particular view, Magister or Mr. being the denota-
tion of a person somewhat above the lower orders of
men, at a time when the addition of gentleman to a
name was considered a respectable designation, and
that of esquire was not, as at present, indiscriminately
given to persons who have not the smallest claim to be
so entitled. On the other hand, fifteen years after
our poet's father had acquired this honourable dis-
tinction, John, not Mr. John Shakspere is recorded in
the register to have married Margery Roberts in
the year 1584 ; and Ursula, Philip, and Humphrey
Shakspere, the issue of this John, by a subsequent
wife (whose name is unknown), in the respective en-
tries of their baptisms in the parish register, are de-
scribed as the children of plain John Shakspere, with-

THE LIFE OF

out any addition This circumstance alone fur-
nishes a very strong presumption that these three
children were not the offspring of the bailiff. But a
more minute investigation of this matter has placed
it beyond a doubt; for our poet's mother, Af(2ry Shak-
speare, having lived till the year 1608, it is manifest
that John Shakspeare, who married Margery Roberts,
Nov. 25, 1584, was the shoemaker already mentioned;
and that the children in question must have been his
children, though not by her ; for she died in 1587.
It appears from the oldest book belonging to the cor-
poration, containing an account of their proceedings
from 1563, that Thomas Roberts, who died in Sept,

^ The same distinction is always preserved in the parish re-
gister between Mr. Thomas Reynolds, a gentleman of Old Strat-
ford, with whom our poet was acquainted, and to whose son he
bequeathed a legacy, and Thomas Reynolds, a tradesman of
Stratford. The children of the tradesman are uniformly descrii)ed
as the children of Thomas Reynolds, those of our poet's friend as
the children of Mr. Tliomas Reynolds. Thus I find in the re-
gister :

*' 1580, Jan. 26, baptized Margaret, baster daughter to Tho-
mas Reynolds.

** 1581, Nov. 8, bapt. Jane, daughter to Mr. Thomas Reynolds.
** 1581, Feb. 25, bapt. William, son to Thomas Reynolds.
*' 1582, Nov. 25, bapt. Thomas, son to Mr. Thomas Reynolds.
" 1582-3, Jan. 22, bapt. Annis, daughter to Thomas Reynolds.
** 1583, Nov. 21, bapt. Henry, son to Mr. Thomas Raynolds.
*• 1589, Nov. 22, bapt. Mary, daughter to Mr. Thomas Ray-
nolds."

So, in the account of Thomas Goodwynne, Chamberlain, for
the year 1582 :

** Receaved for the bell [i. e. for the bell's being rung] for
Thomas Reynhold's child, iiijof.
** Receaved for the bell for Mr. Thomas Reynold's child^ iiijrf."

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 55

1583, was a shoemaker ^ ; and that the John Shak-
speare, who followed the same occupation, was a trus-
tee for his children I at first, from this circum-

3 In an accompt made by William Wilson, one of the chamber-
lains of the borough of Stratford, on the 26th day of Jan. 1581,
stating his several receipts and disbursements from Michaelmas,
1579, to Michaelmas, 1580, is the following article :

*• Receaved of Thomas Asplyn for his freedome, by the hands
of Thomas Roberts, and Thomas Swanne, Wardeins of shuemakers^
xxs." Registr. Burg, Stratford. A.

Thomas Roberts, as appears by the register of the parish of
Stratford, was buried there, Sept. 1 1, 1583.

4 " Stratford ") Ad aulam ibm. tent. ix° die Januarii anno regni

Burgus. ^dnae Elizabethe, &c. xxij° [1589-90.]
** At this hall Mr. Abraham Sturley hath delivered three several
obligations to the use of the children of one Thomas Roberts de-
ceased; viz. one bande made to Thomas Koberts, one of the
sonnes of Thomas Roberts deceased, of fyftie pounds, wherein
Richard Masters of Milverton yeoman and John Shaxpere of
Stratford, corvizer, stand bounde for the bredinge of the seyd Tho-
mas Roberts, and the payment of xxxij/?. according to the condy-
cions of the seyd bande, which bande berithe date quarto die Oc-
tobris anno tricesimo Elizabethae reginse [1588], and one other
bande beringe date tertio die Octobris, a° xxx° Elizabethe Regine
of fyftie pounds made from John Laurence of Studley, husband-
man, and William Broukeley of Studley, tanner, to John Roberts,
one other of the sonnes of the seyd Thomas Roberts, for the pay-
ment of xxvi/z. accordinge to the condicions of the same bande ;
and also one other bande from John Shaxpere of Stratford, cor-
vizer, and Edward Bushell de eisdem, wolsted weaver, in Ixli, for
the bredinge of Richard Roberts, the youngest sonne of the seyd
Thomas, and also for payment of suche money as ys conteyned in
the condycions of the same bande, beringe date tertio die Octo-
bris a° xxx° E. Regine." Registr, Burg. Stratf. A,

From a preceding entry in the same book, it appears to have
been customary for the guardians of infants to reposite bonds be-
longing to their wards in the chamber of Stratford, for security.

THE LIFE OF

stance, thought it probable, that this John married
his widow, whose Christian name was Margery ; but
as she appears to have been hving several years after-
wards, whereas the first wife of John Shakspeare, the
shoemaker, died in 1587, 1 now believe that his wife was
either the sister of his friend Thomas Roberts, whose
Christian name might also have been Margery ^ or the
widow of one Richard Roberts, who, as well as Thomas,
died in 1583. Philip Greene, who was both a miller and
a chandler in Stratford, it appears, was intimately con-
nected with this John Shakspeare, who in the year
1592 was one of Greene's sureties ^, on his receiving
from the corporation the loan of five pounds for three
years, to assist him in his occupation, out of a fund
left by Thomas Oker, of Warwick, for the purpose of
aiding young and industrious tradesmen at Stratford :
a fund out of which John Shakspeare himself had also
received a loan. Philip Greene, without doubt, stood
godfather for his friend John Shakspeare's eldest son,
by his second wife (perhaps a daughter of Philip
Greene ^), whom he married in 1588, his first wife,
Margery Roberts, having died in the preceding year ;
which son was baptized at Stratford by the name of
Philip, Sept. 21, 1591; and Ursula % the wife of

5 Margery appears to have been a common name in this fa-
mily ; for I find that Richard Smith was married to Margery Ro-
berts, Nov. 28, 1598.

6 Seep. 52, n. 1.

7 Joan, daughter to Pliilip Greene^ who, as appears from the
parish register, was baptized at Stratford, June 27, 1569, was
probably the second wife of John Shakspeare^ corvizer.

^ Philip Greene was married to Ursula Burbadge, Oct. 14,

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

Philip Greene, it may be presumed, was godmother
to the daughter of her husband's friend, who was
christened by that name in March, 1588-9. Either
Humphrey Pinder, Humphrey Cowper, or Humphrey
Wheeler, who were all shoemakers, it is highly pro-
bable, was sponsor for Humphrey, the other son of
this John Shakspeare (shoemaker), who was baptized
at Stratford, May 24, 1590.

The various circumstances here insisted on, prove
decisively, that our poet's father had no second wife,
and that the entry in the register of the parish of
Stratford, where we find " Mary Shakspeare, widow,
buried Sept. 9, 1608," relates to our poet's mother.
If, however, a doubt could be entertained on that
subject, the grant of arms to John Shakspeare in
1596, compared with this entry, and with the circum-
stances above stated, would dispel it ; for there her
Christian name is particularly mentioned, [" Mary,
the daughter of Robert Arden,"] though in the sub-
sequent grant of 1599 it was omitted. Her father's
will, and the bill filed in Chancery by John and
Mary Shakspeare, in 1599? which I discovered after
the former proofs were collected and arranged, renders
in this case " assurance double sure

1565. He died at Stratford about ten months after our poet, and
was buried there Feb. ^6, 1616-17.

9 In addition to these concurring circumstances, all tending to
prove that John Shakspeare, the shoemaker, was the person who
married Margery Roberts in 1584, and by a subsequent wife was
the father of Philip, Humphrey, and Ursula Shakspeare; it may
be further observed, that when Thomas Roberts, already men-
tioned, obtained from the corporation of Stratford a lease of his

THE LIFE OF

I once thought it not improbable, that this John
Shakspeare, whose family and connexions I have been
obliged thus particularly to mention, was the eldest
son of the bailiff, born before the commencement of
the register ; but am now convinced, that this could
not have been the case. Had he been our poet's elder
brother, he or one of his sons would have inherited
the freehold estate of John Shakspeare, in Henley-
street, who made no will, as his heir at law ; whereas,
on the contrary, we find that estate in the possession
of William. This circumstance is decisive. It is
equally clear, from various considerations, that he was
not a younger brother of the poet. For, to say no-
thing of his name not being found in the baptismal
register, in the numerous transactions in which he
appears engaged in the regular account of the corpo-
ration acts, I do not find any one of the bailiff's fa-
mily in any manner connected with him ; neither the
father of our poet, the poet himself, nor any of his
brothers, are sureties for him on any occasion : while,
on the other hand, we find other persons, not of his
name, called upon by him, to afford him this kind of
friendly assistance. If he had been the son of John
Shakspeare and Mary Arden, he would undoubtedly
have been distinguished by the addition of junior^

house in Bridge-street, which is dated September 24-, 1578, Tho-
mas Shaxpere, a shoemaker, also, I believe, was an attesting
witness to the bond then executed for the performance of cove-
nants; and an indorsement on the back of that lease, made some
time about the year 1600, proves that this was the house in which
John Shakspeare, the shoemaker, lived after the death of Tho-
mas Roberts, and while it was the property of his children.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 59

which is no where affixed to his name, either in the
register of the parish of Stratford, or in the register
of the proceedings of the corporation, though in each
of these I find this description added to many other
persons. The designation of corvizar, which is
frequently annexed to the name of this John Shak-
speare, affi^rds another proof to the same point. At the
time our poet's father was elected an alderman, among
the burgesses were two persons of the Christian and
surname of William Smythe ; who being, without
doubt, of different families, were distinguished from
each other by their occupations ; one of them being
called William Smythe, corvizar, and the other Wil-
liam Smythe, haberdasher : and thus they are con-
stantly described in the register of the acts of the corpo-
ration. If these persons had been father and son, they
would have been distinguished by the addition of
senior and junior ; as we find, at a subsequent period,
Francis Smythe the elder, an eminent mercer at Strat-
ford, and his son Francis Smythe the younger, were
always distinguished. Besides, had John Shakspeare
been the son of the bailiff, our poet would have un-
doubtedly noticed him or his children in his will ; for
it is extremely improbable that this shoemaker, his
second wife, whom he married in 1588, and all their
children, should have died without issue in the course
of twenty-six years, and yet not one of their names
appear in the register. It is manifest, indeed, from
various minute circumstances, that this John Shak-
speare, so far from being our poet's brother, was not
even a native of Stratford \

» By the rules of the various companies of the several trades

THE LIFE OF

In the Company of Shoemakers and Sadlers, who
were united, the sum paid by a native, who had served
his apprenticeship in the borough, was only twenty
pence ; a higher sum was paid by a foreigner, even if
he had served his apprenticeship in Stratford ; and a
still higher by those foreigners who could not urge
that circumstance in their favour. John Shakspeare,
the shoemaker, it appears, paid for his freedom, on the
20th of January, 1585-6, the sum of thirty shillings.
It is certain, therefore, from this circumstance, that he
was not a native of Stratford. He had probably
served part of his apprenticeship there ; otherwise he
would have paid two pounds, the sum required by
this company from those foreigners who had not
served their time within the borough. In this case,
as well as in many others, somewhat less than the re-
then carried on there, those persons who were foreigners, that is,
not born in the borough, and wished to set up any trade there,
were obliged to pay a much higher sum for their freedom than
the natives. In " the Declaration of the Constitution and Ordi-
nances of Skinners and Taylors/' which was signed and sealed
March 2, 1585, and is yet preserved in the chamber of Stratford ;
the seventh and eighth rules in substance are, that no foreigner
or person born out of the borough, who hath not served an ap-
prenticeship within it, shall be allowed to set up or exercise the
trade of a skinner or taylor, unless he hath served an apprentice-
ship for seven years in some city, borough, or town corporate
and if he hath so served, he may be admitted to his freedom on
paying 6s. 8d, Every person born within the borough, but
having served out of it, may be admitted on paying ten shillings ;
and every person born within the borough, and having likewise
served his time there, may be admitted on paying three shillings
and Jburpence. Similar regulations were made by other com-
panies ; though the terms of admission, both to natives and
foreigners, in the different companies, were various.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 61

gulated sum was accepted on composition, probably
on the ground which I have suggested.

The truth, I believe, is, that the Shaksperian shoe-
maker, of whom I have been obliged to say so much,
was either the son or brother of Thomas Shakspeare,
otherwise Greene (a shoemaker also, as I believe),
who, perhaps, migrated from some of the neighbour-
ing towns to Stratford, where he died in March,
1589-90 ; or the son of another Thomas Shakspeare,
who died at Warvdck, in 1577 ^ ; or of Richard Shak-

* In ** the Accompte of Thomas Rogers, one of the Chamber-
lens, &c. made the thyrde of October 1589, which he then
yielded up in respect he was elected to be Mr. Bayleefe for the
year followinge, a"* regni Eliz. xxxi""." the following persons are
specified as living in Bridge-street, many of whom appear to have
been shoemakers :

" The Rents receaved as followeth, for iij quarters of a year.
Bridg Street. Whole Rent,

Richard Baylis. \s vi^. \\\]d.

Thomas West vs vis. \\\]d.

Robert Wyllson xxvs xxxiijs. iv«.

Mr. Barber xvis. \\]d . . . xxis. v\\]d,

[This is inserted by mistake, for he lived in Church-street.]

Haray fylde. , viis, \id., . . . xs.

Jhon Shackspeare ixs xiis.

Rye. Aynge xvs xxs.

Wyllm Greenwaye xxiijs xxx5. viijW.

Francis Smith \s xiijs. iiijW.

Arthur Cawdrey xxvs xxxiijs. iiijo?."

In the accounts of 1593 and 1594 the names of the persons
who held houses from the corporation are not specified : but a
subsequent Accompt of Richard Ange and Abraham Sturley.
Chamberleyns, from the xx* day of December 1594', for one whole
yeare then next followinge," furnishes us with a complete list of
the tenants who held houses from the corporation, and the rents
they paid.

THE LIFE OF

speare, the elder, of Rowington, who died in April,
1614 ^ ; and it is probable that he, and all his family,
left Stratford, and returned to his native town,
wheresoever it may have been, in 1593, or 1594*.
The last notice which I have found concerning him,
is in June, 1592, at which time he was master of the
Company of Shoemakers ; and three years afterwards
his house was inhabited by another person. His
eldest son, Humphrey (who, as well as his younger
son, Philip, has so long been supposed to be a brother
of the poet's), I have good reason to believe, settled at
Lapworth ^, about ten miles from Stratford. Of
Philip, I have not been able to obtain any intelli-
gence.

SECTION V.

Having, I trust, by the foregoing necessary, though
I fear tedious, disquisition, dispelled the mist of con-
fusion and obscurity in which our poet's family has,

3 See p. 15, n. 8. Ibid.

5 Sarah, the wife of Humphrey Shakspeare, of Lapworth, died
at Rowington in the last century, Oct. 2, 1720, at the age of
eighty-two. Her husband Humphrey, who died at Rowington, in
1729, is thus described (" of Lapworth"), both in the register of
Rowington, and on his wife's tombstone in the churchyard there.
If we suppose him to have been only as old as his wife, then
he must have been born in 1638 : consequently at least ninety-one
when he died ; and he might have been either the son or grand-
son of that Humphrey Shakspeare who was baptized at Stratford,
May 24, 1590 ; and consequently either grandson or great grand-
son of John Shakspeare, the shoemaker.

" John, the son of Humphrey Shakspeare, of Lapworth," was
buried at Rowington, Nov. 14, 1693^ as appears by the register
of that parish.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 63

for near a century, been involved, I now return to
the more immediate object of our present inquiries.

Involvere diem nimbi, et nox humida coelum
Abstulit :

' tandem Italise fugientes prendimus oras, ....

Jamque novum terree stupeant lucesceie Solem.

William Shakspeare was born at Stratford upon
Avon, probably ^ on Sunday, April the 2!3d, 1564 ;
and on the 25th was baptized, we may presume, by
the Rev. John Breechgirdle ^ then vicar of that

^ I say ** probably," because we have no direct evidence for
this fact. The Rev. Joseph Greene, who was master of the free-
school at Stratford, several years ago made some extracts from the
register of that parish, which he afterwards gave to the late
James West, Esq. They were imperfect, and in other respects
not quite accurate. In the margin of this paper Mr. Greene has
written, opposite the entry relative to our poet's baptism, " Born
on the 23a?;" but for this, as I conceive, his only authority was the
inscription on Shakspeare's tomb — Obiit ano Do'. 1616, setatis
53, die 23 Ap." which, however, renders the date here assigned
for his birth sufficiently probable.

The omitting to mention the day of the child's birth in bap-
tismal registers, is a great defect, as the knowledge of this fact is
often of importance.

7 He died at Stratford the following year, and was buried there,
June 21, 1565.

The successive vicars of Stratford in our poet's time were,

John Breechgirdle, 27 Feb. 1560-61.

Hygford, 1563. [Qr.]

Henry Heicroft, Jan. 1, 1569-70.

Richard Barton, Feb. 17, 1584..

John Bramhall, 1590.

Richard Bifield, Jan. 23, 1596.

Thomas Rogers, 1604'.

Thomas Wilson, May 22, 1619.

THE LIFE OF

parish. The custom of giving a son the baptismal
name of his father or paternal grandfather, or in com-
pliment to his mother's father, was not so common in
the age of Elizabeth as at present. Not one of John
Shakspeare's children were named after him or Mr.
Robert Arden. Our poet, I believe, derived his
Christian name either from William Smyth, a mercer,
and one of the aldermen of Stratford, or William
Smith, a haberdasher in the same town, one of whom
probably was his godfather ; and all his brothers, in
like manner, appear to have been named after the
persons who stood sponsors for them. Such, I coiv-
ceive, was then probably the general, as it was cer-
tainly a frequent usage ; a practice which we seem to
have derived from our German ancestors^. Our
author's only son, Hamnet, we find, did not take the
Christian name of his father or grandfather, but of
that friend who appears to have been his sponsor ;
and our author's godson, William Walker, whom he
has kindly remembered in his will, was not only his
godson, but his namesake. In like manner, the bap-
tismal name of young D'Avenant, who was the son of
a vintner in Oxford, and born in 1605, was not de-
rived from his father, or any other relation, but from
our great dramatick poet, who was his godfather ^.

8 See Verstegan's Restitution [of Decayed Intelligence, 4to.
1605 ; Epistle to the English Nation, in marg. It is often seen
in Germanie, that either godfather [he means each of the two
godfathers] at christning giveth his name to his godsonne, and
thereof it cometh that many have two proper names, besydes their
surname."

9 Three of Sir Francis Bacon's godsons, to whom he leaves
legacies, were christened after him. See his will.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

It may be worth observing, that the nativity of our
illustrious countryman, of whom England will
proudly boast as long as she continues to be a
polished nation, took place on the day consecrated to
its patron saint, for whom his native tovm appears to
have had particular respect * : a happy presage, as it

* In an ancient account-book which belonged to the wardens
of the bridge at Stratford, before the charter of incorporation was
granted, I find various articles which ascertain the predilection of
our poet's countrymen to the patron saint of England.

In an account made by Richard Cotton and Thomas Gilbard,
bridge- wardens, 23 March, 3^ Heniy VIII. [1542-3] is this item :

*' Item, payd Whitley for kepynge the Alter, \\]s. \\]d.'' and in a
subsequent account, evidently relating to the same matter, 36
Henry VIII. Item, payd to Thomas Whitley for kepynge St.
George Alter, viija?."

*' Item, payd for scowring S*. George harnes, [armour,] ij^. \0d"

*' Primo anno Mariae reginse, &c. videlicet decimo quarto die
Aprilis, Richard Pers and John Tayler, wardens :

" Item, payd for dressing the Dragon, and for bering the Dra-
gon, and werynge Sent George harnes on holy thursday, ij^. viijW.
Payd for gune powder, m]d. Payd for scowring Sent George harnes,
i]sr

In the account of George Whatley and Robert Pratt, bridge-
wardens, 8 April, 1 Ed. VI. 154^7 :

*• Payd for scowring Sent George harnes, \]s. \\\]d,

*• Item, to Walter for ridynge Sent George, \id.

** Item to hym that bare the Dragon, \ujd"

In an account made by John Bell and Edward West, 2 & 3 Ph.
& Mar. April 23, 1556 :

" Payd to 2 men for berynge the Dragon and Sent George
harnes, ij^."

The same custom was long kept up ; for in the accompt of Ro-
bert Smart and William Wilson, chamberlains, from Michaelmas,
1578, to Michaelmas, 1579, I find—

" P** to William Evans [a smith] for scowring of the George
Armour, the vi"" daye of June, iiijf/."

VOL. II. F

THE LIFE OF

should seem, that his name and reputation should for
ever be united with that of England, and should, to
all future time, shed a lustre on the country that had
the good fortune to give him birth.

That he was snatched from the world at a time
when his faculties were in their full vigour, and before
he was " declined into the vale of years," must ever
be a subject of deep, but unavailing regret, to the
liberal part of mankind. Let us, however, be thank-
ful that this " sweetest child of fancy " did not perish
while he yet lay in the cradle. When he was but
nine weeks old, the plague, which in that and the
preceding year was so fatal to England ^, broke out
at Stratford upon Avon, and raged with such
violence, between the 30th of June and the last day
of December, that two hundred and thirty-eight
persons, in that period, were carried to the grave, of
which number, probably, two hundred and sixteen
died of that malignant distemper ^ ; and only one of
the whole number resided not in Stratford, but in the
neighbouring hamlet of Welcombe. The total

^ In the year 1563, between the 1st of August and the last day
of December, 20,136 persons died of the plague in London. It
broke out again with great violence in August, 1564?.

3 From the two hundred and thirty-seven inhabitants of Strat-
ford, who, it appears from the register, were buried in this period,
twenty-one are .to be subducted, who, it may be presumed, would
have died in six months in the ordinary course of nature ; for it
the five preceding years, reckoning according to the style of tha
time, from March 25, 1559, to March 25, 1564-, two hundred and
twenty-one persons were buried at Stratford, of whom two hun-
dren and ten were townsmen : that is, forty-two died each year,
at an average.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 67

number of the inhabitants of Stratford, at that time
appears to have been about 1470 ^ and consequently

4 Such appears to have been the number of inhabitants at that
time, calculating one in thirty-five to have died annually. I sup-
pose one in thirty-Jive to have then died in a year on account of
the superior mortality in former times from the small-pox, and the
ill treatment of other disorders : one \n forty would at present be
a more just calculation. In the parish of Bookham, in the county
of Surrey, in the neighbourhood of which I passed the summer of
the year 1788, the inhabitants were numbered, and found to be
five hundred. In the preceding year there died there, only eleven
persons, that is, one in forty-six. In a country parish in Hamp-
shire, the annual proportion of deaths for ninety years previous to
1774, was found to be one in fifty. See Howlet's Essay on the
Population of England and Wales, p. 11.

The baptisms and burials at Stratford during the five years
mentioned in the preceding note, compared with the baptisms
and burials during five years from 1783 to 1788, confirm the cal-
culation that has been made.

The baptisms from March 25, 1559, to March 25, 1564, were
two hundred and seventy-six; i. e. fifty-five per ann. at an average

The baptisms from Jan. 1, 1783, to Dec. 31, 1787, were four
hundred and seventy-four : i. e. ninety-five per ann. at an ave-
rage: but of Stratfordians probably only eighty-five.

The burials in five years from March 25, 1559, to March 25,
1564, were, of Stradfordians, two hundred and ten, i. e. forty-two
per ann.; which, multiplied by thirty-five, gives 1470, the num-
ber of inhabitants stated in the text. If we multiply the average
number of the annual baptisms during the same period (i. e. fifty-
five) by twenty-six, the number of inhabitants will be found to have
been 1430.

The burials in five years from Jan. 1, 1783, to Dec. 31, 1787,
were four hundred and nine; i. e. per ann. eighty-two; but of
Stratfordians only seventy ; which number, multiplied by forty,
makes the inhabitants of Stratford on Dec. 31, 1787, 2800, nearly
double the number in our author's time. In April 1765, they were
numbered, and were then found to be 2287.

In 1730, the houses in Stratford (including the old town) were
F 2

THE LIFE OF

the plague, in the last six months of the year 1564,
carried off more than a seventh part of them. For-
tunately for mankind, it did not reach the house
where the infant Shakspeare lay : for not one of that
name appears in the dead list. A poetical enthusiast
will find no difficulty in believing that, like Horace,
he reposed secure and fearless in the midst of conta-
gion and death, protected by the Muses to whom his
future life was to be devoted :

sacra

Lauroque, collataque myrto,
Non sine diis animosus infans 5.

If I were to acquiesce in the tradition communi-
cated to Mr. Rowe, in the beginning of the last cen-
tury, I should now, in due order, and in imitation of
all the biographers who have implicitly followed him
on the same subject ^ inform my readers, that our
poet's father, John Shakspeare, " was a considerable

four hundred and fifty-seven. If we reckon five to each house^
the inhabitants were then 2285. By the returns made to Par-
liament in 1811, it appears that the inhabitants in Stratford
amounted to 2842, whereof 1340 were males, and 1502 were fe-
males, and that the inhabited houses were 548, and the un-
inhabited 13.

5 Hor. lib. iii. ode iv.

^ Jacob's Lives of the Poets, 8vo. 1720. Pope's Edition of
Shakspeare's Plays, 4to. 1725. Theobald's Edition, 8vo, 1733.
General Dictionary, folio, 1739. Hanmer's Edition of Shak-
speare's Plays, 4to. 1744. Warburton's Edition, 8vo. 1747. Il-
lustrious Heads, 1748. Gibber's Lives of the Poets, 12mo. 1753.
Biographia Britannica, folio, 1747. Biographical Dictionary,
8vo. 1760. Biographia Draraatica, 1780, kc. 8tc.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 69

dealer in wool, and had so large a family, ten children
in all, that though he was his eldest son, he could
give him no better education than his own employ-
ment. He had bred him, it is true (continues Mr.
Rowe), for some time, at a free school, where it is
probable he acquired what Latin ^ he was master of ;
but the narrowness of his circumstances, and the
want of his assistance at home, forced him to with-
draw him from thence, and unhappily prevented his
further proficiency in that language ^ ".

It is somewhat remarkable, that in Rowe's Life of
our author, there are not more than eleven facts men-
tioned ^ ; and of these, on a critical examination,

7 So Rowe's second edition. In the first, " that little Latin he
was master of."

^ Rowe's Life of Shakspeare.
9 These facts are :

1. That he was the son of John Shakspeare, and born at Strat-
ford, in April, 1564^.

2. That he died there in 1616. — These are both true, and were
furnished by the parish register.

3. That his father had ten children.

4. That his father was a woolman.

5. That when the poet came to London " he was received into
the company of actors then in being," as if there was then but
one company.

6. That he was but an indifferent actor.

7. That Falsiaff' was originally called Oldcastle, and that the
poet was obliged to change the name of that character.

8. That Lord Southampton gave him 1000/. to complete a pur-
chase.

9. That he left three daughters.

10. That he was driven to take shelter in London in consequence
of stealing deer from Sir Thomas Lucy's park.

The preceding eight facts will all be shown to be false.

THE LIFE OF

eight will be found to be false. Of one (of very little
importance) great doubt may be justly entertained ;
and the two remaining facts, which are unquestion-
ably true (our poet's baptism and burial), were fur-
nished by the register of the parish of Stratford.

We have already seen that one part of the fore-
going account is not true. John Shakspeare, it has
been proved, never had but eight children ; and only
five of them lived to be any burthen to their father,
with respect to their education \ This circumstance,
were we reduced to the necessity of conjecture, might
suggest some doubts concerning such other parts of
this relation as are not supported by better evidence,
particularly that which concerns the occupation of
his father. But on the subject of the trade of John
Shakspeare, I am not under the necessity of relying
on conjecture ; being enabled, after a very tedious
and troublesome search, to shut up this long agitated
question for ever. In a manuscript account of our
author, written above a century ago, by Mr. Aubrey,
an ingenious man, and a most careful, laborious, and
zealous collector of anecdotes relative to our English
poets and other celebrated writers of his native coun-
try, our author's father is said to have been a but-
cher. Mr. Rowe, we have just now seen, about thirty
years afterwards, was informed, from oral tradition,

11. That he introduced Ben Jonson to the stage, may certainly
be considered as extremely doubtful. This tale probably took its
rise from Shakspeare's having assisted Jonson in writing Sejanus^
In the printed play, however, the author omitted whatever our
poet had contributed to that piece.

* See p. 51.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

that he was a woolman. Now, though both these
accounts are equally false, I do not think it necessary
or becoming to throw any ridicule on either of these
gentlemen ; nor shall I represent them as foolish
gossips, because they have transmitted to us such
accounts, on this subject, as they could procure. And
I shall particularly abstain from ridiculing Mr.
Aubrey (whose name ought never to be mentioned
by any friend to English literature without respect),
on account of the tradition which he has transmitted,
lest the weapon pointed at that learned antiquary
should recoil against the breast of him who levelled
it ; for, strange to tell ! we shall presently find that
Ralph Cawdrey, one of the aldermen of Stratford, at
the time our poet was born, was a butcher ^ and was

2 This fact is proved by a deed among the archives of Stratford,
which begins thus:

" This Indenture made the xx*** day of April in the first and
second yere of the reigne of Phylip and Mary [1555], by the
grace of God kynge and quene, &c. between Will". Whatley,
nowe Justice of the peace, hy bely of the burrow of Stratford upon
Avon, in the county of Warr, George Whatley, now Justice of
y* peace and hye alderman of the same toune, Richard Lord, W"'.
Smyth mercer, John Jefferies, Thomas Wynfyld, Thomas Dixon,
Thomas Phyllipps, Henry Bydyll, Thomas Gilbard, Robert Mors,
Robert Pratt, Raf Cawdrey, and Adrean Quyny, aldermen^ John
Burbage, William Mynster, Daniel Phyllypps, Robert Perot,
Laurence Beyiaton, Roger Sadler, Humphrey Plymley, Richard
Harentone, W'". Smyth corvizar, Frauncis Harbage, George
Turnor, Richard Symons, John Wheler, and Lewes ap Williams,
Capital burgesez ther of thone party, and Raf Cauodrey of Strat-
ford aforesaid, Bocher^ of the other party : Witnessethe, &c.
that the befor named hy bely, aldermen and capital burgesez,
with one assent, consent, agreement, for them & ther successors,
have demyzed, gramited, set, and to ferme let, and by theis pre-

THE LIFE OF

bailiff the borough the very year before Mr* John
Shakspeare filled that office. So much for this mon-
strous and incredible story, to which, we have been
told, no one but a man who beheved in preternatural
appearances could, for a moment, give any credit ^.

It is an old and just observation, that omnis fabula
fundatur in hist or id ; the most fictitious accounts

sents do demyse, graunt, and to ferme let over unto the said
Raf Cawdrey, on tenement in Stratford aforsaid, in Burge
Street, late in the holdynge of Richard Marchell ther callyd
The AuHgell," &c.

3 Ralph Cawdrey kept a butcher's shop in Stratford so early
as 1541. He died in May, 1588.

See Mr. Steevens's Advertisement, vol. i. p. 254?.

I shall in another place * have occasion to speak more particu-
larly on this subject, and shall show the sources from whence Mr-
Aubrey derived the various and valuable intelligence which he
communicated to Antony Wood in the latter part of the last cen-
tury, while that laborious antiquary was employed in compiling
his Athenae Oxonienses. At present, it is only necessary to ob-
serve, that if the representation attempted to be given of this in-
genious and unfortunate gentleman, were just and well founded;
if it were true that every man who is weak in one place must ne-
cessarily be weak in all ; that all those persons who in the last
century were idle enough to put their faith in judicial astrology,
and to give credit to stories of preternatural appearances of the
dead, were fools, and their judgment or testimony of no value on
any subject whatsoever, however unconnected with these weak-
nesses; then in this large list of ninnies must we class, with Mr.
Aubrey, the accomplished and literate Charles the First, the grave
and judicious Clarendon, the witty Duke of Buckingham, the fer-
tile and ingenious Dryden, and many other names of equal cele-
brity. They must all ** bench by his side," and must be set
down as persons incapable of forming a true judgment on any
matter whatsoever presented to them, and wholly unworthy of
credit.

* See Appendix.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

which tradition has handed down to us, have gene-
rally had some little semblance or admixture of truth
in them ; and thus, gilded by artifice or ignorance,
they acquire a currency and reception in the world,
which bare and genuine falsehood could never obtain.
Of this kind is the tale in question, which, not with-
out a due portion of those minute and embellishing
circumstances in which such fables usually abound,
was transmitted to Mr. Aubrey, about one hundred
and thirty years ago, by some of the old actors, after
the Restoration ; confounding, it should seem, our
great dramatist with a person of the same name and
county, who lived at the same period, but moved in
a very different sphere ; for, on examining the re-
cords of the Company of Stationers, I learned from
one of their registers, that John Shakspeare, son of
Thomas Shakspeare, a butcher, at Warwick, was
bound apprentice in March, 1609-10, to William
Jaggard, stationer, who, in 1598, had published some
of our author's early poetry, and for whom, in con-
junction with others, the first folio edition of his
plays was printed ; and on further inquiry it appeared
that this butcher's son was admitted to his freedom.
May 22, 1617. Of John Shakspeare, the apprentice
of William Jaggard, it is not necessary to say more
in this place, though, hereafter, I may have occasion to
add a few words concerning him. Unquestionably his
name and parentage, however they were confounded
with those of his great countryman, fifty years after-
wards, were well known, in his own time, among
players and stationers ; for he served his apprentice-

THE LIFE OF

ship to a respectable citizen, appears to have com-
menced the business of a bookseller on his own ac-
count, and was, I believe, the only person of the
name of Shakspeare, who migrated from Warwick-
shire to London, at that period, beside our poet, and
his brother Edmond, and Thomas Shakspeare, who
was one of the Queen's messengers, in 1577.

John Shakspeare, the father of the illustrious
subject of our present narrative, as has been already
observed, settled at Stratford, not very long after the
year 1550. On April 30, 1556, and September 30,

1558, I find him one of the jury of the court leet ;
on the 12th of August, 1556, he was summoned on
a jury in a civil action ; and in June, 1557, he was
one of the ale-tasters, an officer appointed and sworn
at every leet to take care that the due assize was
kept of all the bread, ale, and beer, sold within the
jurisdiction of the leet^. At the leet, October 6,

1559, he was one of the four afFeerors ' appointed to
mulct those who had committed any offence which

4 Restal's Terra es de la Ley, in v.

From the following entry it appears that he was fined while
invested with this office, for three non-attendances in the bailiff's
court, which was held once a fortnight.

** Stratford "I Curia de recordo ibm tent, secundo die Junii,
Burgus. 1 anno regnorum Philippi et Mariae tertio et quarto
[2 June, 1557] :

viiic?. de Johe Shakspere, uno testator [tentator] servicii
burgi pd. quia not venit ad exequend. officium suum p iii Cur. Id.
in mia. [miserecordia]."

For the oath and duties of an ale-taster, see Kitchen on the
Jurisdiction of Courts Leet, p. 96.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 75

was punishable arbitrarily, and for which no express
penalty was prescribed by statute ^ ; and he was
again chosen for the same purpose in May, 1561. It
appears from a paper inserted below ^, that he was
not a member of the corporation of Stratford ante-
cedent to Michaelmas day, 1557 ; but he was cer-
tainly chosen a burgess either on that day, or very
soon afterwards ^. In 1558, and the following year,
he served the office of constable ; which office, as well
as that of ale-taster, all the most respectable members
of the corporation filled, antecedent to their rising to

5 The oath of an affeeror was this : — ** You shall swear, that
you will truly and indifferently tax, assess, and affeer all such
amerciaments as are presented at this court ; wherein you shall
spare no man for love, favour, affection, or corruption, nor raise
nor inhance upon any man^ of malice, more grievous amercia-
ments than shall be thought reasonable, according to the qua-
lity of the offence, and the faults committed, and not otherwise.
So help you God," &c. Greenivood on Courts, p. 346.

In some cases the jury of the leet ascertained the amerciaments
themselves. So in the proceedings of the leet at Stratford, 30th
Sept. 1558 : " Mem. y* the xii men did amerce the offenders, and
no Ferars [Afteerors] chosen." That they had a right to do so.
Sir Edward Coke has shown, 11 Rep. Godfrey's case.

^ See Appendix.

7 There were at that time four vacancies of the burgesses then
assembled. John Lewes was the last ; he being the last person
who had been elected a burgess; and I find that at a subsequent
period, a few years afterwards (Sept. 6, 1564), the name of John
Shakspeare stands the second in the list of burgesses immediately
following that of John Lewes ; so that it is clear that Shakspeare,
together with John Taylor, William Smyth, haberdasher, and
John Jones, whose names immediately follow in that list, was
elected a burgess in the latter end of the year 1 557, or early in
1558, to fill up the four vacancies already mentioned.

THE LIFE OF

higher stations in the borough ®. Having discovered,
among the archives of Stratford, several scattered
fragments, containing an account of the proceedings
of the court leet, twice a year, from 1554 to 1562,
which I have since arranged and bound up together,
I am indebted to them for most of these facts ; and
as some of the orders and presentments made in this
court exhibit a curious picture of the times, I shall
insert a few of them in their proper places ^,

In September, 1561, Mr. John Shakspeare was
elected one of the chamberlains of Stratford, which
office he filled during the two succeeding years. On
July 4, 1565, about fifteen months after our poet's
birth, he was chosen an alderman ; and on the 12!th
of September following he took the usual oath\
The names of the aldermen, when he was chosen,
are furnished by the books which contain an account
of the proceedings of the corporation in their cham-
ber ; but their occupation was not so easily learned^

8 William Tyler was an ale-taster in 1557, and, like John
Shakspeare, fined for non-attendance : Richard Hill executed the
same office in 1555, William Perrot in 1558, and Thomas Dixon,
otherwise Waterman, in 1559. All these persons were soon af-
terwards aldermen. William Tyler was bailiff in 1563, Richard
Hill in 1564-. Francis Harbage was constable in 1555, and bailiff
in 1557 ; and Robert Perrot, who was bailiff' in 1558, executed
the office of constable in 1554-, together with Adrian Queeny,
who was bailiff' in 1559. Humphry Plymley, who was bailiff' in
1562, served the office of constable with John Shakspeare in
1558 ; and William Smith, haberdasher, and William Tyler, who
has been already mentioned, together with John Taylor, were
joined with him as constables in 1559.

9 See the Appendix.

* Ilegistr. Burg. Stratford, A.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

being scarcely ever noticed in those records, except in
the instances already mentioned, for the purpose of
distinguishing two persons of the same Christian
and surname. However, from various researches for
other purposes, I have been enabled to ascertain their
several trades ; and I subjoin them, as it may tend
to make us more intimately acquainted with the state
of Stratford at this time. The aldermen, when our
poet's father was elected into that body, were,
Richard Hill, woollen-draper, who was then bailiff ;
Lewis ap Williams, ironmonger, and afterwards inn-
holder ; William Smith, mercer ; George Whateley,
woollen-draper; Ralph Cawdrey, butcher; Robert
Perrot, brewer ; Adrian Quiney, grocer ; Roger
Sadler, baker ; Humphrey Plymley, mercer ; Robert
Pratt, victualler and tipler ; John Wheler, yeoman ;
William Tyler, grocer ; John JefFeries, attorney, and
soon afterwards steward or town-clerk of the borough.

In 1568 our poet's father attained the supreme
honours of the borough of Stratford, being then
elected high bailiff, an office which he held from
Michaelmas, 1568, to Michaelmas, 1569 ; and two
years afterwards, September 5, 1571, he was elected
and sworn chief alderman for the ensuing year ^.

In the various leases granted by the corporation to
several members of their own body, and to others, the
occupation of the lessee is always mentioned ; but our
poet's father never having taken any lease from them
(as far as I can find), after a reasonable waste of time,
at Stratford, Worcester, and elsewhere, I began to

^ Ibid.

THE LIFE OF

despair of ever being able to obtain any certain intel-
ligence concerning his trade ; when, at length, I met
with the following entry, in a very ancient manu-
script, containing an account of the proceedings in the
bailiff's court, which furnished me with the long
sought-for information, and ascertains that the trade
of our great poet's father was that of a glover,

" Stretford, ss. Cur. Phi. et Mari« Dei gra. &c.
secundo et tercio, ibm tent, die Marcurii. videhcet
xvij. die Junii, ann. predict. [17 June, 1555,] coram
JolTni Burbage Ballivo, &c.

" Thomas Siche de Arscotte ^ in com. Wigorn.
querit.'* versus Johm Shaky spere de Stretford, in
Com. Warwic. Glover, in plac. quod reddat ei oct.
libras, &c."

The tradition that Mr. John Shakspeare was a
woolman, or rather a wool-driver, for such was the
denomination used at Stratford, in his time, perhaps
arose, and certainly derived some little support, from
a very slight circumstance. In a window of one of the
houses in Stratford, which belonged to him, was
formerly a piece of stained glass, now in my posses-
sion, on which are painted the arms of the merchant
of the staple * ; and the same arms may be observed

3 Armiscottey in Worcestershire, was probably the place here
meant. I suppose Arscotte was the usual pronunciation. In the
6th of Elizabeth I find a suit by Richard Hannes of Armj/scotte,
against John Lord, of Stratford.

Arlescote, is a small village near Edghill, in the hundred of Kine-
ton, in Warwickshire ; I can find neither Arscote, nor Alescote, in
Worcestershire.

4 Barry, Nebule of six argent and gules, on a chief of the se-
cond, a lion passant or.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

on the front of the porch of the chapel at Stratford,
built by Sir Hugh Clopton, who was Lord Mayor of
London in the time of Henry the Seventh, and a
merchant of the staple. But this circumstance,
which I formerly mentioned as affording some sup-
port to the traditionary tale, must now yield to supe-
rior and unquestionable evidence. Expressum facit
cessare taciturn, is good sense, as well as good law.
This house, as we shall presently see, was purchased
by John Shakspeare in 1574, and might have been
previously possessed by a dealer in wool ; or the
stained glass above-mentioned, which, perhaps, in the
days of fanaticism and rebellion, was taken out of the
ancient chapel of the guild of Stratford, might have
been placed there in the middle of the seventeenth
century.

The trade of a glover, at least in the metropolis,
should seem, in the time of Queen Elizabeth, not to
have been an unprofitable one ; for the demand for
this article appears to have been very general. I find
there were, at this time, at least five glovers in the
town of Stratford ^, and there may have been others,
whose names I have not discovered. Gloves were

5 Thomas Nichols, Gilbert Bradley, John Davies, Richard Rad-
man, John Coxe, and — Hyll, were all glovers at Stratford
nearly at this period. One or two of them, however, may have
been somewhat later. From an accompt made by Richard
Hathaway and Wm. Smith, in 1618, it appears that the following-
seven persons were then glovers in Stratford : George Perry,
jun. John Perkins, Henry Hill, Richard Nicholls, John Cawdrey,
Augustine Boyse, Michael Hare. Besides these there were at
least three other glovers then residing there, viz. John Smith,
Robert Butler, and William Shaw, elder brother of Julius Shaw.

THE LIFE OF

then a more ornamental part of dress than they are at
present ; many of them hemg perfumed, and some
decorated with gold ^. The high-topped gloves of
bishops, judges, and others of the graver professions,
were frequently trimmed v^ith gold fringe ; and on

^ *' — their fingers must be deckt with gold, silver, and pre-
cious stones, their handes covered with their suoeete tvashed gloves,
imbroidered 'with gold, silver, and tvhat not.'' Stubbes's Anatomie
of Abuses, Svo. 1583.

*' Here, hold this glove, this milk-white cheveril glove,
*' Not quaintly overwrought with curious knots ;
** Not deck'd with golden spangs, nor silver spots,
** Yet wholesome for the hand, as thou shalt prove."

Cynthia, a collection of Sonnets, by Richard
Barnefield, 8vo. 1595, Son. xiv.
" After that they presented to his Majesty a Greek Testament

in folio and two pair of Oxford Gloves with deep fringe of gold,

the turnovers being wrought with pearl ; the cost 61. a pair."
Account of King James' s Reception at Oxford in 1605, Winuoood's
Mem. ii. 140.

In the wardrobe account of Prince Henry, eldest son of James I.
dated Sept. 28, 1607, the following articles occur:

" One pair of gloves lined through w^ith velvett, and laid with
three gold laces, and gold fringe curled, \xs.

** Two pair of Cordevant gloves, perfumed and laid with broad
silver lace, and fringe curled, at 325. Ixiiij?.

*' Four pair of staggs leather gloves perfumed and fringed with
gold and silver fringe at 16^. [per pair] Ixiiij^.

" Six pair of plain gloves with coloured tops being very well
perfumed, at 6s. [per pair] 36*.

" Six pair plain gloves with coloured tops, and some white tops
at 3^.

Twelve pair fine gloves stiched, the fingei-s and the tops
white silk and silver, and some trymmed with tafl^ata and reben,
at lis." Archceolog.xi. 9^.

In Chapman's All Fools, a comedy, 1606, gloves from half a
crown to tiuenty crowns a pair are mentioned.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

the celebration of weddings, and the presentation
of new-year's gifts ^, gloves were a very costlj
article.

"About the 14th or 15th year of Queen Eliza-
beth," [1571 or 1572,] says the continuator of
Stowe's Annals, " the Right Hon. Edward Vere, Earl
of Oxford, came from Italy, and brought with him
gloves, sweet bags, a perfumed leather jerkin, and
other pleasant things ; and that yeare the queene had
a payre of perfumed gloves, trimmed onlie with four
tuftes or roses of cullored silke The chronicler,
writing near fifty years after the period mentioned, is
not quite accurate as to the time when this fashion
was imported ; for the Earl of Oxford, as appears
from Lord Burleigh's Diary ^, did not return to
England, from his travels in Italy, till the year
1576, which was the 18th year of Elizabeth. This
foreign fashion, of perfuming and adorning gloves,
was, without doubt, soon imitated by the English ;
and, accordingly, I find that perfumed gloves were
sold in common, in London, only two years afterwards,
in 1578 ^ : at a subsequent period, the pack of our
poet's Autolycus is plentifully furnished with them ^.
That a great number of persons followed this occupa-

7 In the Manuscript Diary of Edward Alleyn, the player, pre-
served at Dulwich College, is the following article :

" 1618. Jan. 1. Given Mr. Austin a pair of gloves, \l. \0s. Od"

8 Stowe's Annals, published by E. Howes, fol. 1615, p. 868.
The paragraph in question was an interpolation by the editor.

9 Murden's State Papers, p. 778.

• Florio's First Fruites, 4<to. 1578.

* Gloves as sweet as damask roses,
Masks for faces, and for noses ; . . . .

Come, buy," &c. Winter's Tale, Act IV. Sc. III.
TOL. II. G

THE LIFE OF

tion, may be collected from a petition presented to
the lords of the comicil, in 1594, by the glovers
dwelling xvithin forty miles of London, against the
leather-sellers, who, by engrossing the skins used in
the manufacture of gloves (which were chiefly those of
deer and goats), had so enhanced the price of that
commodity, that if some regulation were not made
to restrain them, thousands of glovers (it was alleged)
would be forced to beg in the streets ^.

In the country, gloves of the most ordinary kind
were, I find, sold at so low a price as four-pence the
pair ^ ; but those used by persons of a superior rank
were undoubtedly much dearer; and sometimes, on
marriages and other occasions, when gloves were
intended to be given as presents, the country
manufacturers vied with the Londoners in the
ornament and expense of this part of dress. The
great profits of trade, however, depend rather on
an equal and constant sale, than on the caprice of
fashion, or the casual demands made on extraordinary
and incidental occasions ; and in this surer basis of
successful commerce, the trade of a glover was not
deficient : for, at that period, in the country, and
probably in the metropolis too, he furnished his cus-
tomers with many articles, beside gloves, of more
necessary and ordinary use ; with leathern hose,
aprons, belts, points, jerkins, pouches, wallets,
satchels, and purses : each of which, except, perhaps,
the last, the lower classes of society had frequent
occasion to purchase.

3 Strype's Hist, of London.

4 This appears from various inventories of the effects of dealers
in leather at Stratford.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 83

SECTION VL

The manufacture of gloves, which was, at this
period, a very flourishing one, both at Stratford and
Worcester (in which latter city it is still carried on
with great success), however generally beneficial,
should seem, from whatever cause, to have afforded
our poet's father but a scanty maintenance. Of his
circumstances, about the time of his eldest son's
birth, some conjecture may be formed from a sub-
scription entered into, for the relief of those that
were visited by the plague, in 1564, and from other
contributions towards the aid of the poor in the same
year : the benefactions of John Shakspeare, at that
time, seem to denote a moderate, though not the
lowest, rank among the contributors ^. He was not.

5 " At a hall holden in oure garden, the 30 daye of Auguste,
a°. 1564-, money p*^ towards the relief of the poure.

Baylie, iii^. \u]d.
M' Alderman, us. x'nid.
M' Smyth, ii^. v'ld.

Jefferies, xnd.
M' Cawdre, ii^.

Adrian Quiney, ii5. vid.
M' Lewis, lis.

[i.e. Lewis ap Williams]
John Weler, ii^. id.
Robert Bratte, vie?.
Robert Parot, ii^. \id.
M"" Botte, iiii^.

John Taylor, vind.

John Shackspere, xud.

John Lewes, via?.

Jhon Sadler, v'lid.

Jhon Aylmer, xiid.

Will™ Tyler, xud.

W™ Smyth, haberdasher, xiid.

W" Smyth, corvesar, iiid.

Jhon Belle, xiid.

W'" Brace, ij^.

Thomas Dixun, viiic?.

Th^ Dyer, ij^.

Rich*^ Symens, vii^. ui}d.
On the 6th of Sep. the bailif and six aldermen gave twelve
pence each " to the relief of those that were visited ; " Mr. Quiney,

G 2

THE LIFE OF

indeed, then an alderman. There is, however,
abundant proof that, about twelve years after he
had obtained that station, when our author was
about fourteen years old, he was, by no means, in
affluent, or even easy, circumstances. Though his
wife was an heiress, and King Henry the Seventh had
been very liberal to her grandfather, she brought to
her husband, we have seen, no other land but the
small estate of Asbies, which was mortgaged, for
forty pounds, to Mr. Edmond Lambart, in 1578 ;
probably to pay for the purchase of two houses in
Stratford, for which that sum, precisely, was disbm'sed.
The valuable lease, which had been made to her
grandfather, it should be remembered, expired in
1528, some years before she was born. With respect,
however, to the distressed situation of Mr. Aldennan
Shakspeare, at this period, we have surer grounds
to rest upon, than conjectm-e ; for the following
extracts, from the records of the borough of Strat-
ford, afford a decisive proof of what has been sug-
gested :

" Burgus ) Ad aulam ibm tent. xxix° die Janu-
Stratford. j arii, a*" regni dnae Elizabeth, &c. vicesimo
[1577-8].

" At this hall yt is agreed that every alderman
except such underwrytten excepted, shall paye
towards the furniture of three pikemen, ij billmen.

Is. 6d. ; Jn. Shakspeare, John Sadler, Wm. Smyth, haberdasher,
Jn. Botte, and Jn. Taylor, 6d. each ; and Rob. Brat, 4a?. ; and on
the 27th of Sept. another donation nearly in the same proportion.

Registr. Burg. Stratford. A.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

and one archer, vi*. v'njd. and every burgess, except
such under wrytten excepted, shall paye iij^. ivd.

" Mr. Plymley, v^. ^

" Mr. Shaxpeare, iij. ivd,

" John Walker, ij^. vid,

" Robert Bratt, nothinge in this place.

" Thomas Brogden, ij,y. vid.

" William Brace, i}s,

" Anthony Tanner, ij^. vid.

" Sum \ilL xiiijfi?.
" The inhabitants of every ward are taxed as by
the notes to them delivered yt may appear."

" Ad aulam ibm tent. xix.° die Novembris a"* regni
dnse Elizabeth &c. xxi.° [1578] :

" Itm yt is ordeined that every alderman shall
paye weekely towards the releif of the poore iiijt/.
saving John Shaxpeare, and Robert Bratt, who shall
not be taxed to paye anythinge. Mr. Lewes and
Mr. Plimley are taxed to pay weekely, eyther of
them iijd. apece, and every burgesses are taxed
weekeley at ijd. apece

An account of money levied on the inhabitants, in
the following year (1579), for the purpose of pur-
chasing armour and weapons of defence, corresponds
with the foregoing statements ; for the name of John
Shakspeare is found among the defaulters ^.

^ Humphrey Plymley died in such poor circumstances in April,
1594', that the sum total of his effects, as appears from his inven-
tory, amounted only to 61. I5s. 2d.

7 Registr. Burg. Stratford. A.

^ *' Accompt of money levied xi°. die Marcii An", regine Eliza-
beth xxi°. [1578-9] : by John Smith and William Wilson :

THE LIFE OF

A will, also, which I found some time ago, in the
Prerogative Office, has furnished me with a further
confirmation of the distressed circumstances of our

High strete warde — x\s. i}d.
Ship strete warde — xxxi^. vid.

Henley strete warde — xxxis. vu]d. Sum vli. iij^. viijc?.
whereof disbursed iij7/. xi^. xid. so remaiieth xxxis. vud. w"^' was
payd to M' Barber, and not yet accounted for.
Accompt of Richard^ Wood strete warde. Received xli^. viijc?.
Court and James /^Churche strete warde - - xliiij^. viijJ.
Salisbury, for - Bridge strete warde - - xxxijs. xd.

Sum xixs. [jd. not
accompled for ; remaneth.
which was payd to Mr. Barber ; whereof leid out by him

for iij corselets iij/. xij^.

for iij calivers with the furniture - - - x\s.
for the cariage of them ----- vi^. u]d.

Sum \l. xvnjs. uyl. Remaneth xxixs. i]d. dew by
M' Barber.

John Eonge — iiijc?.
George Badger — xiid.
Thomas Ward — v'ld.
M\ Shaxpeare — iij^. u^d.
M' Nashe — iij^. Vujd.

M' Reynolds — iij^. ui}d. C compted for.

William Brokes — ij^.
Bazill Burdit— iiijf/.
Hugh Pyggyn— -vif/.
Widow Bell — in}d,

<' Richard Court ys to accompt for money collected by him for
the hygh waye."

I am aware that among the above defaulters, are some persons
who were probably in easy circumstances ; but though their neg-
lect may not have arisen from want of money, the other proofs
which have been given relative to the straitened circumstances of
John Shakspeare, warrant us in supposing that he was a defaulter,
from its not being convenient to him to pay the rate imposed.

These somes are unpayd and unac-

WILLIAM SFIAKSPEARE. 87

poet's father, at this time. Mr. Roger Sadler, as
has been already mentioned, was a baker, in Strat-
ford ; and, living in the same street with him, pro-
bably served him with bread. He died in the latter
end of the year 1578. To his will, made on the
14th of November, in that year (in which he appoints
his kinsman, and our author's friend, Hamnet Sadler,
one of his residuary legatees, as well as one of his
executors), he has subjoined a list of debts due to
him (a common practice at that time) ; by which it
appears, that John Shakspeare was then considered
insolvent, if not as one depending rather on the
credit of others than his own \

The following extract from the register of the Bailiff's Courtis
also observable.

" Stratford 1 Curia dnse Reginae ibm tent. xiii. die Januarii, anno
Burgus. J regnickc. vicesimo octavo [1585-6].
*' Ad hunc diem Servien. ad Clavam burgi predict, retorn. pr.
[praeceptum] de distr. eis direct, versus Johem Shackspere ad sect.
Johis Browne, qa, predict. Johes Shackspere nihil habet unde
distr. potest levari. Ideo fiat Ca. [Capias] versus Johem Shack-
spere ad sect. Johis Browne, si petatur."

On the 2d of March following an alias Capias was issued against
him.

' " Debtes which are owing unto me Roger Sadler.
" Imprimis, of M'. John Combes, the elder, for a horse, Si.
" Item, of the same J. C, due to me by bond at Christmas
next, 201.

" Item, of Richard Hathaway, alias Gardyner, of Shottery,
61. Ss. ^d.

" Item, of Edmond Lambart *, and Corm^h^, for the debt of
iV^^ John Shacksper, 5l."

* Mr. Edmond Lambart, who it appears had entered into a
security for John Shakspeare to the amount of five pounds, and
had also furnished him with forty pounds on a mortgage of his

THE LIFE OF

In addition to all these concurring circumstances,
we have the confession of our poet's father himself ;
for, in the bill which he exhibited in chancery, in
1597, he describes himself as a " man of very small
wealth, and who had very few friends, or alliances,
in the county of Warwick." This declaration, in-
deed, was made several years after the period now
under consideration ; but, at the same time, corre-
sponding with all the various proofs here adduced,
serves, in some degree, to corroborate them.

While this subject is under our consideration, the
following notices, preserved in a manuscript, in the
Herald's Office, which I have already had occasion to
quote, require to be particularly considered.

At the bottom of the grant of arms to John Shak-
speare, made in 1596, we are told — " This John

estate, lived, as we have already seen, at Barton on the Heath, in
Warwickshire, where he died, according to his son's account,
about the year 1586. He was perhaps a relation of Mary Shak-
speare ; for her mother, Agnes Arden, left a legacy to " Joan
Lambard," who might have been the wife of Edmond. That
Mr. Lambart was obliged to pay this debt for Mr. John Shak-
speare, may be inferred from the statement made by Shakspeare
himself in the bill which he filed against his son. See Appendix.
The other friend of our poet's father, here mentioned, who, ac-
cording to the mode of that time is familiarly called Cornish, was
perhaps the son of Walter Cornish, who lived in Stratford, in
Wood-street, as appears from the fa llowing entry in an account
book of the bridge-wardens of Stratford :

Anno regni regis Henrici Octavi decimo sexto.
" Item the saide Bruge-wardens lafte in the box at their de-
partyng [a blank here in the original] the which was geven by
the hole consent of the honesty of Stratford to the reparation of
the tenement in Woode Streete in the tenure of Walter Cor-
nyshe."

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 89

sheweth a patent thereof under Clarence Cook's
hands in paper xx years past ^.

" K justice of peace, and was haylif, officer, and
chief of the towne of Stratforde upon Avon, xv or
xvi years past ^.

" That he hath lands and tenements of good
wealth and substance, 500/.

" That he married a daughter and hey re of Arden,
a gent, of worship

One of these assertions, it must be acknowledged, is
wholly inconsistent with the account I have now
given, concerning the distressed circumstances of
John Shakspeare ; but, when the history of this
paper is known, it will not, I conceive, tend, in the
smallest degree, to invalidate the foregoing state-
ment.

It appears, from another manuscript in the same
office ^, that Sir William Dethick, and Camden, had

* This grant was made by Robert Cook, Clarencieux ; and
if it was made to John Shakspeare whilst he was bailiff, it must
have been made between Michaelmas, 1568, and Michaelmas,
1569, which was twenty -seven years at least before these notes
were written. In the exemplification of 1599, the heralds ex-
pressly say that John Shakspeare obtained a grant of arms uohile
he ivas bailiff'.

3 This also, as appears from the foregoing note, is a great inac-
curacy. " Twenty-six or twenty-seven years past " would have
been nearer the truth.

4 Vincent, 157, No. 24-. — A gentleman of worship was the
phrase of the day, denoting a person of a respectable situation ;
if not wealthy, yet at least in easy circumstances.

5 W. Z. p. 274-. " The Answer of William Deihick, Garter^
principal king of arms, to two matters, among others, whereof he
was accused by some of the officers, whereof information was

THE LIFE OF

been charged, by some of the officers of the College of
Arms, with having granted several arms w^rongfully,
either in respect of the arms themselves, which, in
some cases, were said to be too similar to others
already possessed by various ancient families, or in
respect of the persons to whom they were granted,
who, it was alleged, were either tradesmen, or per-
sons of so low a condition as not to be entitled to such
an honourable distinction. Among the persons to
whom objection seems to have been made, on both
these grounds, was John Shakspeare ; and the notices
or minutes concerning him, above given, appear to
have been short hints, preparatory to the defence
which was made in form, on the 10th of May, 1602,
before Henry Lord Howard, Sir Robert Sidney, and
Sir Edward Dier, chancellor of the order of the
Garter, against the libellous scrowl, as Dethick terms
it, which had been exhibited against him and
Camden ^ ; and, therefore, these notices are not to

heard the 1st day of May before the Right Hon. Henry Lord
Howard [Qr. Lord Henry Howard, afterwards Earl of North-
ampton], Sir Robert Sydney, Lord Governer of Flushing, and
Sir Edward Dier, Chancellor of the order of the garter, and
day given the said Garter to answere hereunto, namely, the 10th
of May ensuing, 1602."

^ " The Answere of Garter and Clarenciaux, kings of arms, to
a libellous scrowle against certen arms supposed to be wrongfully
given.

" Right Honorable. The exceptions taken in the Scrowle of
Arms exhibited, doo concerne these armes granted, or the per-
sons to whom they have been granted. In both, right hon'''%
we hope to satisfy your Lordships."

They then mention twenty -three persons, to whom they were
charged with having granted arms improperly, either in respect of

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 91

be implicitly relied on. It is observable, that when
these officers made their defence in form, an extract
from which is given below, they said nothing about

the persons, or of the arms granted. Among these is found John
Shakspeare ; against whom the charge seems to have been two-
fold ; and without doubt, one of ihe allegations of the *' scrowle,"
or bill of complaint (which I have in vain endeavoured to recover),
was, that he was a tradesman.

The answer of the heralds (as far as we are concerned with it)
is as follows :

" Shahespere.—\i may as well be said that Hareley, who
beareth gould a bend between two cotizes sables^, and all
other that [bear] or and argent a bend sables, usvirpe the
coat of the Lo. Manley. As for the speare in bend, is a patible
difference ; and the person to whom it was granted hath borne
magestracy, and was justice of peace at Stratford upon Avon. He
married the daughter and heire of Arderne, and was able to main-
tain that estate."

I add a few of the other answers, as they serve to confirm what
I have suggested, that the occupation of John Shakspeare was
one of the grounds of the complaint.

" Peake. — Mr. Peake is no grasier, but he is a gentleman of
Grayes Inn, well qualified in all good study and learning, and of
competent living. But he made good proofe that this coate of
arms was borne by his grandfather, John Peake of Thurlangton
in Leicestershire," &c.

" Cowley. — This Walter Cowley, who as it cannot be denied
to be descended of that house of Cowley in the county of Staff,
untruly called Ironmonger^ being unwilling to prejudice the heir
of that house," «S:c.

*' Whitmore. — Mr. Whitmore a rich marchant of London, born
in the countie of Salop, where he possessed fair lands,'' &c.

** Elkyn. Lee, — Mr. Elkin and Mr. Lee, who are depraved
as hase tradesmen^ it is well knowen they have bin both Sheriffs of
London, and M'. Lee shortlie to be Maior of that cittie : so that
it cannot be denied but unto men of that place of civil govern-
ment, such honor of arms hath bin alwayes allowed in former
ages." MS. in Off. Arm. W.Z. p. 276.

92 THE LIFE OF

these " lands and tenements worth 500/. but only
asserted, generally, that John Shakspeare married an
heiress of good family, and was able to maintain that
estate : and assuredly John Shakspeare never pos-
sessed property of such value. I have abeady had
occasion to observe, that the confirmation of arms, in
1599> was obtained chiefly to do honour to our poet,
as descended, by his mother, from the ancient and
opulent house of Arden ; and hence, probably, the
insertion of the words, great grandfather^ in that
instrument, instead of grandfather^ which is found in
a former grant : Robert Arden, the favoured servant
of King Henry the Seventh, being the grandfather
of John Shakspeare's wife, and, consequently, the
great grandfather of our poet, who was then more
immediately the subject of the heralds' consideration
than his father. It is extremely probable that they
applied to him, on this occasion, for he was then in
London ^, to furnish them with materials for their
defence ; and as he, without doubt, stated to them
the value of his own real property, at that time, they
might, when they wrote these minutes, very naturally
suppose that it had descended to him from his father,
who had died about nine months before. It is re-
markable that eight days before the hearing of this
cause, our poet had completed a purchase (as we
shall see hereafter), which, added to his former ac-
quisitions, gave him lands and tenements nearly of
the value of fve hundred pounds. Being, however,

7 That our author was in London, in May, 1602, is proved by
an endorsement on the back of a deed, which will be more par-
ticularly mentioned hereafter.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

I suppose, in due time apprized of their error, the
heralds, when they drew up their defence in form,
deserted their original ground, and made no precise
mention of the landed property of his father.

John Shakspeare was, however, certainly possessed
of a freehold estate, derived from his wife, which I
have already estimated; and of another small landed
property, consisting of two houses, situated in Henley-
street, in Stratford, with a garden and orchard an-
nexed to each, which he purchased, in the year 1574,
from Edmond and Emma Hall, for forty pounds ^ ;
and which, at his death, descended to his eldest son.
Whether, antecedent to his purchasing these houses,
he lived in either of them, as a tenant, is uncertain ;
and consequently the precise place of our poet's birth,
like that of Homer, must remain undecided. At the
court leet, held in October, 1556, the lease of a house
in Greenhill-street was assigned to Mr. John Shak-

^ This appears from the chirograph of a fine now before me
levied to John Shakspeare by Edmund Hall and Emma his wife,
in Michaelmas term, 17 Eliz. [1574] which was obligingly com-
municated to me by the late Charles Boothby Schrympshire
Clopton, Esq. grandson of Sir Hugh Clopton, of Stratford upon
Avon. That these two houses were situated in Henley-street, is
ascertained by a deed executed in 1639, by our author's grand-
daughter and her husband, for which I was indebted to the same
gentleman. Joan Hart, our poet's sister, to whom by his last
will he devised one of them for her life, lived in it in 1639 ; and
Joan Hiccocks, widow, in the other. One of these houses, a few
years afterwards (164'7), was the Maidenhead Inn, which was then
kept by John Rutter, and was, in 1794', the property of Thomas
Hart, a butcher in Stratford, the sixth in descent from Joan Hart.
The other was a few years ago sold by his father, Thomas Hart, to
Mr. John Peyton of the same town.

THE LIFE OF

speare, by George Turnor, who was one of the bur-
gesses of Stratford, and kept a tavern or victualling-
house there ; and another, in Henley-street, was, on
the same day, assigned to him, by Edward West, a
person of some consideration, who, during the reign
of Edward the Sixth, had been frequently one of the
wardens of the bridge of Stratford ^. Concerning any
other land that he possessed or occupied, beside that
which has been already mentioned, I have met with
no notice whatsoever, except what was furnished by
various searches in the chapel of the rolls, where I
found that, in the year 1570, he held, under Wil-
liam Clopton, of Clopton, Esquire, a field, of about
fourteen acres, known by the name of " Ingon, alias
Ington meadowe," situated at a small distance from
that estate which his son afterwards purchased \ Of

9 *< Stratford super Avon. Vis fra Pleg. cum cur. et Session
pais tent. ibm. secundo die Octobris annis regnorura Philippi et
Marie, Dei gratia, &c. tertio et quarto [October 2, 1556].

*' It. pre. [presentant] quod Georgius Turnor alienavit Johe
Shakespere et hered. suis unum tent, cum gardin. et croft, cum
pertinent in Grenehyll stret, tent, de Dfiojibe p cart, ^redd.inde
dno p annu vi* et sect. cur. et ide Johes pd. in cur, fecit dno
fidelitatem J eisdem. ^

*' It. quod Edwardus West alienavit pd. eo Johe Shakespere
unu tent, cum gardin. adjacen. in Henley street p redd, inde dno
p ann. vi*^. et sect. cur. et ide Johes pd. in cur. fecit fidelitatem."

Greenhill-street, where one of these houses v^^as situated, was
at the end of Rother-street, and seems to have been partaker more
of the country than the town ; for in the leet, Oct. 1, 1557, I
find the following entry : " Raf Hilton [presented] for his wyfe
beyng a hedge-breker, and takynge and carryeng away of Nichols
hedge in Grenehyll stret. And he stands amersyd."

» In an indenture made June 11, 1581, is (in substance) the
following recital : " Whereas William Clopton by a former in-

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

this little farm, the annual rent was eight pounds ^ ;
which is above eleven shillings an acre, and near
three times more than the usual rent of that time.
Some peculiar circumstances attending the ground
must have been the occasion of so high a price having
been paid for it. Probably there was a good dwell-
ing-house and orchard upon it ^.

In the short notes, which I have had occasion par-
ticularly to consider, the heralds mention that Mr.

denture tripartite dated Dec. 11, 13 Eliz. [1570] and enrolled,
between William Clopton and William Sheldon of the first part,
Rice Griffin of the second part, and Edward Griffin of the third
part, in consideration of 1550/. did fully and absolutely give, grant,
bargain and sell to the said Rice Griffin all and singular the lands,
tenements, &c. in Bishop Hampton, Stratford upon Avon, Ingon,
the old towne of Stratford, &c. in the said former indenture par-
ticularly mentioned, that is to say, one leasehold or pasture, &,c.
.... and also one other freehold with the appurtenants, called
or known by the name of Ingon alias Ington meadowe, containing
by estimation fourteen acres, be it more or less, then in the oc-
cupation of John Shaxpere or his assigns." Rot, Claus. 23 Eliz.
p. 10.

This spelling of our author's name, which, as we have already
seen, was then very common, ascertains beyond a doubt how it
was pronounced in his own time.

* This appears from an indenture made May 30, 1568, between
William Clopton, Esq. of the one part, and Sir Robert Throck-
morton, Sir Thomas Lucy, Knight, Edmond Plowden, Esq. Ralph,
son of William Sheldon, Esq. William Underbill, of Newbold
Revel, in the county of Warwick, Esq. John Acombis, of Stratford
upon Avon, in the said county of Warwick, gentleman (and
others), on the other part. Claus, 10 Eliz. p. 13. Ingon mea-
dow was not then in the possession of John Shakspeare.

3 This meadow, it is observable, is described as *' a freehold,
tKith the appurtenances.'' See Claus. 13 Eliz. p. 6, and23£/z>. p. 10.

THE LIFE OF

John Shakspeare was a justice of peace; from which,
however, we are not to suppose that he was in the
commission of the peace for the county of Warwick.
He was, in fact, only a justice of peace in Stratford,
during the year when he exercised the office of bailiff,
and the year when he was elected chief or capital
alderman; each of whom, while they filled those
stations, were invested, by the charter, with the full
power and authority belonging to a justice of peace,
within the precincts of the borough Lest, however,
any doubt should be entertained on this subject, I
think proper to add, that I have examined a manu-
script list of the justices of peace, in each county
in England^, made, in the year 1579, by order of
Lord Burghley, and that the name of John Shak-
speare is not found among them.

4 See the list of aldermen in a lease made to Ralf Cawdrey in
the year 1555^ p. 71, n. 2.

5 MSS. Reg. 18 D. 3.

Another paper in the same volume furnishes a remarkable
proof of the inaccuracy of our ancestors in the computation of
miles ; and which, therefore, may be worth recording, though not
connected with the present subject. It contains an account of
the posts which, it is said, were laid towards Ireland, '* for her
majesties speedier and better service, both for the carrying of
packets and expedition of messengers," in 1579, 1580, and J 581.
The road through Lichfield to Chester is estimated at one hun-
dred and thirty-three miles; and from Chester through Rhyd-
land and Beaumarris to Holyhead, at fifty-four miles. Total from
London to Holyhead, one hundred and eighty-seven miles. The
real distance is two hundred and seventy-eight miles. At that
time one packet-boat only sailed every week from Holyhead to
Dublin.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

SECTION VII.

In the age of Queen Elizabeth, to read and write,
it is well known, was not nearly so common as at pre-
sent, but was considered a valuable accomplishment.
Fitzherbert, about thirty years before she ascended the
throne, advises those gentlemen in the country, who
could not write, to aid their memory by making
notches on a stick ^. About the time of our poet's
birth, the majority of the corporation of Stratford ap-
pear to have been entitled to the eulogy bestowed by
Jack Cade upon those who " do not use to write their
names, but have a mark of their own, like honest
plain-dealing men ; " for out of nineteen persons who
signed a paper, relative to one of their body who had
been elected bailiff, ten of whom were aldermen, and
the rest burgesses, seven only could write their names ;
and among the twelve marksmen is found John Shak-
speare ^. To the order that has furnished me with

^ " The Boke of Husbandry, very profitable and necessarie for
all persons." 8vo. 1534.

7 The mark of the bailiff is thus pompously introduced :
** The sign manuel of George Whateley, high Bailiff." Among
the aldermen, Roger Sadler, Ralph Cawdrey, and Lewis ap
Williams, make their marks. Adrian Quiney, Humphrey Plymley,
William Sraythe, mercer, William Bott, and Richard Hill, sign
their names.

The mark of John Shakspeare is considerably below his name,
in consequence of the town clerk's having written it so close to
the name immediately above, that if he had made his mark di-
rectly opposite to his name, it would have intrenched on that of
the person who preceded him. It was, indeed, his usual custom
to set his mark lower than his name. In the latter part of his
VOL. II. ^ H

THE LIFE OF

this intelligence, which is dated Sept. 27, 1564, the
high bailiff, Mr. George Whatley, and three of the
aldermen, assented by making their marks. Of the
burgesses, one only (William Brace) subscribes his
name. The mark then used by our poet's father,
nearly resembles a capital A, and was perhaps chosen
in honour of the lady whom he had married. The
same mark appears opposite to his name as one of the
affeerors, appointed at the court leet, in October,
1559. On the 29th of January, 1588-9, of twenty-
seven persons who signed a paper in the council-cham-
ber of Stratford, fourteen make their marks ; and
among the marksmen are found Mr. William Wilson,
the high-bailiff, and four of the aldermen. Such,
however, was the change, and so great the improve-
ment in this respect, in a short period, that about
eight years afterwards, out of twenty-eight persons
who sanction another paper, on the 9th of January,
1596-7 (including all the aldermen and burgesses of
Stratford), seven only were marksmen ® ; and of nine^
teen persons whose signatures are affixed to an order,
made on the 27th of Sept. 1598, six only do not sub-
scribe their names.

Our poet's father, however he might be counte-
nanced by a great number of those with whom he
lived in intimacy, who were equally deficient in this
respect with himself, could not but have had frequent
occasions in the course of his business to feel and la-
ment the want of this useful accomplishment, and to

life he contented himself with making a cross instead of the A,
which he had formerly used.
* Registr. Burg. Stratford, A.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

observe the solid advantages derived from literary
attainments, even of the lowest class ; and therefore,
we maybe sure, would not neglect the education of his
children. Perhaps a deficiency of this kind in a
father of a good understanding, is one of the strongest
incentives to take especial care that his son shall not
labour under the same defect.

At Stratford, there had been, long before the char-
ter of incorporation granted by King Edward the
Sixth, a free school for the education of youth ^. By
that charter, this school, which was ordered from
thenceforth to be called The King^s New School of
Stratford upon Avon, was confirmed and established

9 Hugh Clonne, scholemaister of Stretford, was admitted into
the fraternity of the Guild of the Holy Cross in the year 1430 ;
9 Henry VI. Registr. Gild. fol. xxxviii. b.

The grammar school of Stratford, according to Leland (Itin.
vol. iv. p. 2, fol. 167, a.), " was founded by one Jolepe, a Master
of Arts, born in Stratford, whereabout he had some patrimony,
and that he gave to this schoole." But both he and Dugdale are
mistaken in the name of the founder, who was Thomas Jolyffe,
as appears by a rent-roll of the lands, &c. of the guild of the
Holy Cross, made October 5, 1530 [22 Henry VIII.], and now
among the archives of Stratford ; the last article of which is —
*' Redditus terrarum et tenementorum Magistri Thome Jolyffe^
The land which he bequeathed lay in the hamlet of Dodwell.
The whole value of a close there, and of his tenements in the old
town, and in Rother-street, amounted at that time only to
2l.\1s.6d.

The school seems to have been kept in our author's time in the
chapel of the guild ; for on the 18th of February, 1594-5, the fol-
lowing order was made by the corporation of Stratford : " At
this halle yt ys agreed by the Bayliffe and the greater number of
the company nowe present that there shalbe no schole kept in the
chapel from this time followinge."

H 2

100

THE LIFE OF

for ever, with a salary of twenty pounds a-year to the
master. Here, without douht, our poet was placed ;
and if we suppose him to have been first made ac-
quainted with the rudiments of literature in the year
1572, when he was eight years old, and to have con-
tinued his grammatical studies to the year 1578, his
instructors must have been Mr. Thomas Hunt (curate
of Luddington, a village in the neighbourhood of
Stratford), and Mr. Thomas Jenkins, who were succes-
sively masters of the free school during that period \

* As it may gratify those persons who are more immediately
connected with the town of Stratford, I subjoin as perfect a list
as I have been able to form from various loose and unconnected
papers, of the successive masters of the free school there, from the
latter end of the reign of Henry the Eighth :

1546, William Dalam (not Dalum, as Dugdale has it).

1554^, William Smart.

1563, Allen.

1565, John Browns worde.

1568, Acton

1570, Walter Roche.

1572, Thomas Hunt. [ob. Ap. 7, 1612.]

1577, (or before), Thomas Jenkins.

1580, John Cotton.

1583, Alexander Aspinall t.

1624, John Trapp.

1669, John Johnson.

1689, Thomas Willes.

1716, Gabriel Barrodale.

1735, Joseph Greene.

* Cambridge Coll. Corp. Christi. 1572, Tho' Acton, conv^
2dus, matriculated, perhaps the son of Acton, schoolmaster.

t Brazen Nose Coll. Alex"" Aspinall, Lane. 20 ann. Oxon.
venit 1573. Reg™. Matric. So he must have been born in 1553.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 101

Of his school-days, unfortunately, no account whatso-
ever has come down to us ; we are, therefore, unable to
mark his gradual advancement, or to point out the
early presages of future renown, which his extraordi-
nary parts must have aflPorded ; for as it has been ob-
served by a great writer of our own time, all whose re-
marks on human life are sagacious and profound,

1772, David Davenport.

1774, James Davenport.

1792, John Whitmore.
In a paper without date of year, containing a list of contri-
butors of certain sums as " a free and voluntary present to his
Majesty, in pursuance to an act of parliament, and a commission
thereupon issued, dated the 6th day of August last past ; " signed
by John Holbech, Rec. I find the name of " Benjamin Bed-
dome Schoole -master ; " but I know not to what period he ought
to be referred : perhaps to the reign of Edward VI. immediately
after William Dalam.

During the years 1575, 1576, and part of 1577, in the cham-
berlain's accounts, from which, during those years, I derive my
information, the annual stipend is only stated generally to have
been made " to the schoolmaster " without specifying his name ;
so that it is uncertain whether the office during that period was
filled by Mr. Hunt or Mr. Jenkins, though from preceding and
subsequent entries, it is certain that it was filled by one or the
other of those gentlemen. Mr. Thomas Hunt, who had the
honour to be one of our poet's school-masters, was buried at Strat-
ford, April 12, 1612. Mr. Alexander Aspinhall, who was near
forty years school-master of Stratford, and was chosen one of the
burgesses, married Oct. 28, 1594, Anne, the sister of Julius
Shaw, one of the witnesses to Shakspeare's will, William
Dalam, the first person in the foregoing list, was one of the five
priests of the guild of Stratford, as appears by an ancient deed,
executed March 10, 35 Henry VIII. which is preserved among
the archives of that corporation. The other four priests at that
time were, Roger Egerton, Nicholas Coterel, John Payne, and
Thomas Hakyns.

102

THE LIFE OF

" there is no instance of any man, whose history has
been minutely related, that did not in every part of
life discover the same proportion of intellectual
vigour Were our poet's early history accurately
known, it would unquestionably furnish us with many
proofs of the truth of this observation ; of his acute-
ness, facility, and fluency ; of the playfulness of his
fancy, and his love of pleasantry and humour ; of his
curiosity, discernment, candour, and liberality ; of all
those qualities, in a word, which afterwards rendered
him the admiration of the age in which he lived.

How long he continued at school, or what profi-
ciency he made there, we have now no means of ascer-
taining. I may, however, with the highest proba-
bility assume, that he acquired a competent, though
perhaps not a profound knowledge, of the Latin lan-
guage : for why should it be supposed, that he who
surpassed all mankind in his maturer years, made less
proficiency than his fellows in his youth, while he had
the benefit of instructors equally skilful ? His friend
Mr. Richard Quiney, one of the aldermen of Strat-
ford in his time, who had certainly been bred some
years before our poet, at the same school, his family
having been long established in Stratford, was so well
acquainted with that language, that his brother-in-law,
Mr. Abraham Sturley, who was also an alderman, fre-
quently intermixed long Latin paragraphs in his letters
to him, several of which I have read ; nay, on one oc-
casion I have found an entire Latin letter addressed to
him ^ ; and Mr. Sturley certainly would not have

^ Dr. Johnson's Life of Sydenham.
3 See Appendix.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 103

written what his brother could not understand. His
eldest son too, Richard Quiney, who afterwards became
a grocer in London, but returned finally to his native
town, where he died in 1656, sent his father, whilst
he was employed in the metropolis on the business of
the corporation, a Latin letter, which, though it had
been required as an exercise from his master, it would
have been ridiculous to send to one who could
not read it*. In the school of Stratford, therefore,
we have no reason to suppose that Shakspeare was
outstripped by his contemporaries. Even Ben Jonson,
who undoubtedly was inclined rather to depreciate
than over-rate his rival's literary talents, allows, that
he had some Latin. Dr. Farmer, indeed, has proved,
by unanswerable arguments, that he was furnished by
translations with most of those topicks which for half
a century had been urged as indisputable proofs of his
erudition ^. But though his Essay is decisive in this
respect, it by no means proves that he had not acquired,
at the school of Stratford, a moderate knowledge of
Latin, though perhaps he never attained such a mas-

The writing of Latin letters to their fathers, appears to have
been a common exercise enjoined to the scholars of Shakspeare's
age. Thus in the Mastive, or Young Whelp of the Old Dogge
[a collection of epigrams and satires], 4to. 1615, Signat. D.
verso ;

" Who dares say Doltas speaketh barbarisme,
*' That scholar-like, can make a syllogisme ;
** Can cap a verse which may deserve commend,
*' And hath his grammer rules at's finger's ende;
Can write a' pistle to his dad in Latin," &c.
5 ** Essay on the Learning of Shakspeare, by the Rev.
Richard Farmer, B. D." 8vo. 1767.

104

THE LIFE OF

tery of that language as to read it without the occa-
sioiial aid of a dictionary. Like many other scholars
who have not been thoroughly grounded in the an-
cient tongues, from desuetude in the progress of life,
he probably found them daily more difficult ; and
hence, doubtless, indolence led him rather to English
translations, than the original authors, of whose
works he wished to avail himself in his dramatick
compositions : on which occasion he was certainly too
careless minutely to examine whether particular pas-
sages were faithfully rendered or not. That such a
mind as his was not idle or incurious, and that at this
period of his life he perused several of the easier Latin
classicks, cannot, I think, reasonably be doubted ;
though perhaps he never attained a facility of reading
those authors with whom he had not been familiarly
acquainted at school. From Lilly's Grammar, which
we know furnished him with the rudiments of the
Latin tongue, and a small manual, entitled Pueriles^,

^ See the Dedication prefixed to his Arthur Gorges' Transla-
tion of Lucan, by his son Carew Gorges, folio, 1614. ** I re-
member this sentence in my Pueriles, Voluntas ubi desunt vires,
est laudanda, &c," From Peek's historical play of Edward I.
4to. 1593, if he did not intend a blunder, Pueriles and Cato's
Moral Distichs should seem to have been the same book, with
a double title : " It is an old sayde saying I remember I redde it
in Catoes Pueriles, that cantabit menus,'' &c. But Drayton
mentions them as different :

*' And when that once Pueriles I had read,
*' And newly had my Cato construed," &c.

Epistle to Henry Reynolds, Esq,
Tully's Offices was at that period a common school-book.
** Whereunto (says Peacham) I might add Gyges' Ring and his
[Tully's] Offices, which booke, let it not seeme contemptible

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 105

and the Moral Distichs of Cato, he proceeded, as was
the fashion of that age, after reading TuUy's Offices,
to the Eclogues of Baptista Mantuanus \ and those of
Virgil; and from thence, prohably, to Cornelius Nepos,
some parts of Ovid (whom he has cited in the Taming
of the Shrew, and from whom he has taken the motto
prefixed to his first publication), and finally, perhaps,
to the ^neid of Virgil. Such I imagine was the pro-
gress, and the extent of his scholastick attainment.
He needed not, however, as Dryden has well observed,
" the spectacles of books" to read men ; and I have no
doubt, that even from his youth he was a curious and
diligent observer of the manners and characters, not
only of his young associates, but of all around him ; a
study in which, unquestionably, he took great delight,
and pursued with avidity during the whole course of
his future life.

That his father was compelled by the narrowness of
his circumstances, and the want of his son's assistance
at home, to withdraw him from school, at least before

unto you, because it lyeth tossed and tome in every sclioole."
Comp. Gent. 4to. 1622, p. 45.

Lord Burghley, Peacham tells us, was so fond of Tally's Offices,
that he always carried that book in his pocket.

Drayton's Epistle, above quoted, furnishes us with the first
poetry then put into the hands of learners ; Mantuan, and the
Eclogues of Virgil.

For the method of teaching then adopted by school-masters,
see Mount Tabor, or Private Exercises of a Penitent Sinner,
8vo. 1639, p. 10, by R. W. [i. e. R. Wallis,] Esq. The
author was, like Shakspeare, born in 1564-.

' Of this author, then very popular, he has quoted the first
line in Love's Labour's Lost.

106

THE LIFE OF

the year 1578, to which period I suppose him to have
remained there, though it is asserted by Mr. Rowe, no
sufficient proof has been produced. At the free school
of Stratford he was entitled to a gratuitous education ;
and he certainly could be of no great use to his father,
before he had attained the fourteenth year of his age.
He had, it should be remembered, three brothers :
Gilbert, who was born in October, 1566, and without
doubt derived his Christian name from Gilbert Bradley,
a glover, who lived in the same street with John
Shakspeare, and who was chosen a burgess on the same
day that our poet's father was elected an alderman ;
Richard, baptized March 11th, 1573, whose god-
father was probably Richard Hill ^, one of the alder-
men of Stratford, and, I believe, related by marriage
to his wife ; and Edmond, who was baptized May 3,
1580, and, doubtless, derived his baptismal name from
his father's friend, Mr. Edmond Lambarte, with whom
at that time he appears to have been on amicable
terms, though a few months afterwards a breach took
place between them. Gilbert, the second son, was little
more than two years younger than our poet, and, at
the time now under our consideration, was as capable

^ Having found the will of Mr. Richard Hall in the Prerogative
Office (which was made May 16, 1590, and proved Feb. 8,
1593-4-, in the beginning of which year he died), I hoped to
have been able to ascertain this circumstance ; but was disap-
pointed. He bequeaths " to every god child that he then had,
12af.," but does not mention any of them specifically by name.
On an action on the case being brought in the bailiff's court
against our poet's father, by Mr. Nicholas Lane, in Hilary term,
29Eliz. [1587], Mr. Richard Hill entered into a special bail-
bond for the appearance of the defendant.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

107

of carrying out parcels of gloves for his father (all that
a boy could do) as his elder brother. For this pur-
pose, therefore, it was not necessary to impede the
progress of the eldest son's education.

Instead of being brought home to assist his father
in trade, various passages in his works incline me to
believe, that our poet's ardent curiosity about that
period, led him frequently to attend the court of re-
cord, which sat at Stratford once a fortnight ; in
which the bailiff, with the assistance of the steward,
or town clerk, who was always a legal practitioner,
heard and determined all causes arising within the
jurisdiction of the borough, where the matter in con-
test did not amount to thirty pounds. In this court
the proceedings appear to have been very regular and
orderly; they had their appearances, their essoins,
their imparlances, their demurrers, their issues knit,
and their trials by jury, all in proper form. There
were at that time, in Stratford, at least six attorneys
who practised in this court, beside Mr. Henry Rogers,
the steward or town-clerk ^ who was also an attorney.

' Mr. Henry Rogers was town clerk of Stratford in 1577, and
continued to hold that office till Michaelmas, 1586.

This officer was called touon-clerk at a very early period ; Mr.
Richard Symons being so described in the account of the pro-
ceedings of the leet, October 5, 1554-.

Afterwards he was called steward, which name he uniformly
bore from 1570 to 1610, when Mr. Thomas Greene, a solicitor in
chancery, and a relation of our poet, is stated in the chamber-
lain's account to receive his salary by the name of touon-clerk.
From that time the two names were indiscriminately used. Sir
Hugh Clopton, who filled the office in 1705, signs himself
seneschallus. The salary of the office was then 10/. a year.

108

THE LIFE OF

In the office of this person, who was immediately con-
nected with the corporation, having a salary of seven
pounds per annum, a part of which was given " for
assisting the bailiff and chief alderman with his
counsel, in affairs appertaining to their office," or with
Mr. William Court, who appears to have been occa-
sionally employed by Mr. John Shakspeare, I suppose
our poet to have been placed for two or three years ;
and I think it very probable that his friendship with
Mr. Francis Collins, who, I believe, was nearly of the
same age, and afterwards was an eminent attorney at
Stratford, commenced at this early period, in conse-
quence of their passing some time in the same office.
The comprehensive mind of our poet, it must be
owned, embraced almost every object of nature, every
trade, and every art, the manners of every description
of men, and the general language of almost every pro-
fession : but his knowledge and application of legal
terms, seems to me not merely such as might have
been acquired by the casual observation of his all-
comprehending mind ; it has the appearance of tech-
nical skill ; and he is so fond of displaying it on all

The successive town clerks of Stratford, in our author's time,
were

Mr. Henry Higford, 1560.

Mr. John Jefferies, 1570.

Mr. Henry Rogers, 1577.

Mr. John Jefferies, jun. 1586.

Mr. Thomas Greene, 1603.
The principal attorneys of Stratford about the year 1580, were
Mr. Henry Rogers above-mentioned, Mr. Thomas Trussel, Mr.
William Court, alias Smith, Mr. Richard Spooner, Mr. Edward
Davies, Mr. Richard Symmons, and Mr. William Bott.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

109

occasions, that there is, I think, some ground for sup-
posing that he was early initiated in at least the forms
of law. Of this notion, which perhaps professional
hahits first suggested to me, I shall subjoin below, I
will not say the proofs, but such circumstances as seem
to me to render it extremely probable

» " for what in me was purchased,

" Falls upon thee in a much fairer sort."

King Henry IV. P. II,
Purchase is here used in its strict legal sense, in contradis-
tinction to an acquisition by descent.

" Unless the devil have him in fee-simple, with Jine and re-
coveryj" Merry Wives of Windsor.

** He is 'rested on the case.'" Comedy of Errors.
" — with bills on their necks, Be it knovon unto all men by
these presents,'' &c. As You Like It.

** — who writes himself armigero, in any bill, tvarrant, quit'
tance, or obligation." Merry Wives of Windsor.
" Go with me to a notary, seal me there
** Your single bond.'' Merchant of Venice.
" Say, for non-payment that the debt should double."

Venus and Adonis.

On a conditional bond's becoming forfeited for non-payment of
money borrowed, the whole penalty, which is usually the double
of the principal sum lent by the obligee, was formerly recover-
able at law. To this our poet here alludes.

" But the defendant doth that plea deny ;
*' To 'cide his title, is impanelled
" A quest of thoughts." Sonnet 46.
In Much Ado About Nothing, Dogberry charges the watch to
keep their fellom' counsel and their oivn. This Shakspeare
transferred from the oath of a jury-man.

And let my officers of such a nature
" Make an extent upon his house and lands."

As You Like It.

*' He was taken tvith the manner.'* Love's Labour's Lost.
" Enfeofd himself to popularity."

King Henry IV. P. I.

110 THE LIFE OF

However this may have been, our poet appears to
have continued at Stratford at least till the year

" He will seal the fee-simple of his salvation, and cut the entail
from all remainders, and a perpetual succession for it perpetu-
ally." AlVs Well that Ends Well.

*' Why, let her except before excepted:' Twelfth Night.
" — which is four terms, or two actions ; — and he shall laugh
without intervallums." King Henry IV. P. II.

" — keeps leets and latv-days." King Richard II.
** Pray in aid for kindness." Antony and Cleopatra.
No writer but one who had been conversant with the technical
language of leases and other conveyances, would have used de-
ter7nination as synonymous to end. Shakspeare frequently uses
the word in that sense. See vol. xvii. p. 183, n. 3; and vol. xx.
p. 235, n. 8. " From and after the determination of such term,"
is the regular language of conveyancers.

" Humbly complaining to your highness."

King Richard III.
" Humbly complaining to your lordship, your orator," &c. are
the first words of every bill in chancery.

*' A kiss in fee-farm ! In witness whereof these parties inter-
changeably have set their hands and seals." Troilus and Cressida.
*' Art thou a feodary for this act?" Cymbeline.
See the note on that passage, vol. xiii. p. 100, n. 6.
*' Are those precepts served?" says Shallow to Davy in King
Henry IV.

Precepts in this sense is a word only known in the office of a
justice of peace.

*' Tell me, what state, what dignity, what honour,

" Can'st thou demise to any child of mine?" K. Richard III.

** — hath demised, granted^ and to farm let," is the constant
language of leases. What poet but Shakspeare has used the
word demised in this sense ?

** This fellow might be in his time a great buyer of land, with
his statutes, his recognizances, his fines, his double vouchers, his
recoveries." Hamlet.

Perhaps it may be said, that our author in the same manner
maybe proved to have been equally conversant with the terms of

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

Ill

1585. " Upon his leaving school," says Mr. Rowe,
" he seems to have given entirely into that way of
living which his father proposed to him ; and in order
to settle in the world in a family manner, he thought
fit to marry, while he was yet very young." Our poet,
like many other persons at that period, entered into
the matrimonial state when he was little more than
eighteen years old ; but that this measure was proposed
to him by his father, we have no evidence whatsoever,
nor is it very probable. His writings, as well as the
testimony of his contemporaries, afford abundant
proofs of the warmth, the tenderness, and the sensi-
bility of his disposition ; and this, much more than
any recommendation of his father, was the occasion of
his wishing, at an early period of life, to participate in
" the sweet silent hours of marriage joys ; " for I be-
lieve it will be- found invariably true (and I wish to
impress this truth on the minds of my fair country-
women), that the most beautiful part of the creation
have ever experienced the most ardent attachments in
the bosoms of men whose manners were elegant, and

divinity or physick. Whenever as large a number of instances
of his ecclesiastical or medicinal knowledge shall be produced,
what has now been stated will certainly not be entitled to any
weight. Malone.

A large addition might be made to this list of the instances in
which legal language has been used in Shakspeare. But as this
notion, after it had been suggested by Mr. Malone, originally in
a note appended to his Essay on the Chronological Order of
Shakspeare's Plays, Art. Hamlet, was adopted both by Mr. Steevens
and Mr. Ritson, these gentlemen have called the attention of
the reader to many passages of this description in the course of
their comments. Boswell.

112

THE LIFE OF

whose understandings and taste were vigorous and re-
fined :

' in the gentlest 3 hearts
" Imperious love hath highest set his throne 4. "

Anne Hathaway, whom our poet married, probably
in June or July, 1582, was then in her twenty-sixth
year, that is, seven years and a half older than her
husband : a disproportion of age, which seldom fails,
at a subsequent period of life, to be productive of un-
happiness, and which, perhaps, about thirteen years
afterwards, gave rise to a part of the following beau-
tiful verses on the subject of marriage ; which no man
who ever felt the passion of love, can read without
emotion :

" Ah, me ! for aught that I could ever read,
" Could ever hear by tale or history.

The course of true love never did run smooth ;
" But either it was different in blood,
*' Or else misgraffed in respect of years,
" Or else it stood upon the choice of friends,
" Or, if there were a sympathy in choice,
** War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it ;
" Making it momentany as a sound,
" Swift as a shadow, short as any dream,
" Brief as the lightning in the collied night,
" That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth ;
" And ere a man hath power to say, Behold !

The jaws of darkness do devour it up.
" So quick bright things come to confusion 5."

Perhaps, indeed, the same feeling suggested the

3 Gentle was used by Spenser and his contemporaries with
the sense of generosus, bene moratus.

To the truth of this sentiment our author himself bears tes-
timony in his Two Gentlemen of Verona ;

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

113

following judicious precept, at a still later period, when
our poet was in his forty-third year :

" DuTce. What years, i' faith ?\

*' Viola. About your years, my lord.

" Diihe. Too old, by heaven ! Let still the woman take
" An elder than herself : so wears she to him ;

So sways she level in her husband's heart ;
*' For, boy, however we do praise ourselves,
*' Our fancies are more giddy and infirm,
*' More longing, wavering, sooner lost and worn,

** Than women's are.

" Then let thy love be younger than thyself,
" Or thy affection cannot hold the bent

From this inequality of years, I have sometimes
fancied that the object of our poet's choice was a
widow ^. They were not married at Stratford, no

« ■ as in the sweetest buds

** The eating canker dwells, so eating love
" Inhabits in the finest wits of all."

5 A Midsummer Night's Dream, Act I. Sc. I.

6 Twelfth Night, Act II. Sc. IV. vol. xi. p. 403.

7 This notion was first suggested to me by finding that Mr.
William Wilson was married to Anne Hathaway, of Shottery,
January 17, 1579-80; and I suspected that he died between that
time and 1582. But, on a further examination, I found that Mr.
William Wilson, who was an alderman of Stratford, lived to the
year 1605. She could not, therefore, have married Shakspeare.
Besides, as I have observed above, it is much more probable that
our poet's wife was of Luddington.

The late Mr. Joseph Greene, vicar of Welford, near Stratford,
imagined that our poet's wife was of Shottery ; induced, probably,
by finding, in the Stratford register, the names of Richard
Hathaway, otherwise Gardiner, of Shottery, and his descendants,
frequently occur ; and he supposed that a remarkable house in
Shottery, which in his time was the property of two ladies of
the name of Tyler, and had formerly belonged to an old Md,

VOL. II. I

114

THE LIFE aP

entry of their marriage appearing in the register of
that parish ; nor have I heen able to ascertain the day

Quiney, might have descended from Thomas Quiney, on whose
marriage, with the poet's second daughter, he might have settled
this house, which, it was suggested, he might have acquired as a
part of his wife's portion. But it is clear, from Shakspeare's will,
that he had not paid his second daughter's portion^ at the time of
his death, though he had covenanted to give her 100/. which, ac-
cordingly, he does, in his will ; and he makes no mention of a
house in Shottery.

Mr. Bartholomew Hathaway, a substantial yeoman, who was
the possessor of the Shottery estate, and who, I believe, was the
son of Mr. Richard Hathaway, born before the commencement of
the register, died at a good old age, in 1624?. From his will, which
was made December 16, 1621, and proved at Stratford, Decem-
ber 6, 1624, I find that he had three sons ; John, Richard, and
Edmond. To Richard he bequeaths twenty shillings ; to
Edmond, his third son, 120/. to be paid in seven years after his
decease ; and to his eldest son, John, his messuage, in Shottery,
with the appurtenances, and two yard lands and a half [about
seventy-five acres], lying in the fields of Shottery and Old Strat-
ford ; limiting the said lands to him and the heirs of his body,
remainder to his son Edmond, remainder to Richard. To each of
the children of his son John, viz. Alice, Richard, Anne, and
Ursula, one of his best ewes. To his own daughter, Anne, the
now wife of Richard Edwards, the sum of thirty shillings ; and to
each of her seven [q. six] children, Avery, Bartholomew, Alice,
Thomas, Richard, and Ursula, 6s. y'md. His executor is his son
John ; and Mr. John Hall, of Stratford, and Stephen Burman, of
Shottery, his overseers ; to each of whom he leaves 2s. \id. Avery
Edwards, the person above-mentioned, lived, in the year 1622,
at Luddington, as appears from the collector's subsidy book,
19 Jac. in the chamber of Stratford. Richard Hathaway, a
baker, who was elected an alderman of Stratford, April 18, 1623,
and died there in October, 1636, was probably the second son of
the above-named Bartholomew.

I do not believe that there was any other person of the name of
Hathaway, who had an estate at Shottery ; and Bartholomew's

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

115

or place of their union, though I have searched the
registers of several of the neighbouring parishes for
that purpose. The tradition, however, concerning
the surname of his wife, is confirmed by the will of
Lady Barnard, our poet's grand-daughter, which I
discovered a few years ago ; for she gives several lega-
cies to the children of her kinsman, Mr. Thomas
Hathaway, formerly of Stratford ; and still more de-
daughter, Anne, we see, was married to Richard Edwards. The
'wife of our poet might, indeed, have been Bartholomew Hatha-
way's sister; but, as she was yet living when his will was made,
and no mention is made of her in it, nor any memorial given to
her, I think it improbable that she should have been his sister.

I may add, in confirmation of what I have suggested (that our
poet's wife was not of Shottery), that Susanna, the daughter of
Thomas Hathaway (Shakspeare's great nephew, as I believe),
who was baptized at Stratford, June 11, 164cS, and to whom,
without doubt, Mrs. Susanna Hall was godmother, is de-
scribed, in the parish register, as the daughter of Thomas Hath-
away, without any addition ; as are William, son to the same
Thomas Hathaway, baptized April 19, 16i0 ; Rose, his daughter,
baptized November 6, 1642; and Elizabeth, another daughter,
baptized January 10, 1646-7. Whereas, we find that Edmond,
" son to John Hathaway, of Shottery," baptized November 23,
1628, and Elizabeth, daughter of the same Jolin Hathaway, of
Shottery, baptized January 22, 1625-6. This distinction is con-
stantly preserved in the register. I mention these circumstances,
as they show that the Hathaways, who were related to our poet's
daughters, were not of Shottery. Mrs. Judith Quiney was, with-
out doubt, sponsor for Judith, another daughter of the same
Thomas Hathaway ; and our poet's grand-daughter. Lady Bar-
nard, bequeaths legacies to his several children above-named ;
Susanna, Judith, Rose, and Elizabeth ; which last was certainly
her own godchild. She calls him " her kinsman Thomas Hath-
away, late of Stratford upon Avon."

I 2

116

THE LIFE OF

cisively by a deed, which was executed June 2, 1647 ^,
in order to lead the uses of a fine and recovery of our
poet's estate, then in the possession of his eldest daugh-
ter, Susanna Hall; in which the parties were, that lady,
and her daughter, Elizabeth Nash, of the first part ;
William Smith, of the second part; and William
Hathaway, of Weston upon Avon, yeoman, and
Thomas Hathaway, of Stratford, joiner, of the third
part. This Thomas Hathaway was, without doubt,
either the son or brother of William; and was origin-
ally not of Stratford, but, as I conjecture, of Weston,
a town in Gloucestershire, about four miles from it.
That he was not originally of Stratford, appears not
only from there being no notice of his baptism in the
register of that parish, but from his having paid, as a
foreigner, on the 25th of March, l6S6,Jift7/ shillings
for his freedom ; of which sum twenty shillings were
restored to him, as a grace, by the corporation ^. We
have seen already, that our poet was natm-ally con-
nected with the family of Arden. Mr. William Arden,
who appears to have been second cousin to his mater-
nal grandfather, Robert Arden, married a daughter of
Edward Conway, Esq. ^ a gentleman of large fortune,
who was proprietor of Luddington, a village about
two miles from Stratford. Some persons of the name

8 Penes Charles Boothby Schiymshire Clopton, Esquire.

9 Registr. Burg. Stratford, B. The ordinary sum paid by a
native was but 3^. 4^/.

Mr. Thomas Hathaway died at Stratford, where he was buried,
January 15, 1654-5.

' Cod. MS. in Officio Arm.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 117

of Hathaway, were tenants to his grandson, Sir John
Conway, early in the reign of Elizabeth, though one of
them is said to have had a little patrimony of his own,
probably at Weston ; and the Marquis of Hertford, to
whom Luddington belongs, has informed me, that in
his youth he remembers a person of the name of
Hathaway, a tenant on that estate ^. Here, therefore,
it is not improbable, Shakspeare found his wife ; and
the marriage, in consequence of her father having
some property at Weston, was perhaps celebrated
either there (rather than Stratford, in which parish
Luddington is), or at Billesley, of which parish the
church is very little distant from Wilmecote, the ori-
ginal residence of his mother. The ancient registers
of Weston and Billesley having, like many other an-
cient registers, been thrown by and lost, as soon as
they were filled with names, and it became necessary
to procure a new blank book, it is now impossible to
ascertain this point ^.

^ I have since learned that Mr. John Hathaway farmed part of
this estate, till the year 1775, when he died.

3 The earliest register of the parish of Weston now extant,
begins in 1 680. Weston being in the diocese of Gloucester, I
hoped to have found, in the proper office there, a duplicate of the
several entries contained in the more ancient register, which has
been lost ; but, after taking a journey to Gloucester expressly
for the purpose, I was disappointed; no transcript of the names of
any persons married in the year 1582, being there extant. These
very useful transmisses were, indeed, first enjoined to be sent
from the various parishes, in each diocese, by the canons made
in 1601 ; but, I apprehend, the practice, in some places, pre-
vailed before. Though Cromwell's injunctions for the orderly
registering of all marriages, baptisms, and burials, were not
issued till 1538, I have seen some registers of an earlier date.

118

THE LIFE OF

In May, 1583, our poet's wife brought him a
daughter, who was named Susanna ; a name w^hich
she, perhaps, derived from Mrs. Susanna Collins, the
wife of Mr. Francis Collins, already mentioned ; and,
about eighteen months afterwards, she was delivered
of twins, a son and a daughter, who were baptized
(Feb. 2, 1584-5) by the names of Hamnet ^ and
Judith. Shakspeare's friend, Mr. Hamnet Sadler,
and his wife, Judith Sadler, were, without doubt,
sponsors to these children. Our author's wife does
not appear to have ever brought him another child.

SECTION VIII.

The course of the present narrative now leads us to
advert to a circumstance, in our poet's life, of the
utmost moment ; since to it, if the tradition is to be
trusted, we are indebted for his removal from Strat-
ford to London, and for the rich legacy which, in
consequence of his connexion with the stage, he
afterwards bequeathed to posterity ; and, if it be a
mere fiction, it is the bounden duty of the historian

The ancient register of Billesley is also lost. It is observable,
that our poet's grand-daughter was married to her second husband
in the church of Billesley (which is but three miles from Strat-
ford) ; perhaps, in consequence of her grandfather's having been
married there.

4 In consequence of a mistake committed by the late Rev.
Joseph Green, in making an extract from the register of the
parish of Stratford, which he gave to the late Mr. James West, in
1770, our poet's only son was, for a long time, erroneously sup-
posed to have been baptized by the name of Samuel. His true
name I recovered from the register.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

119

of his life, minutely and explicitly to refute an un-
founded calumny. The deviation from truth which
the inquiries I have made have enabled me to
detect, in several received accounts concerning our
poet and his family, which, for a century, have been
considered as authentick, did not originally much in-
cline me to place an implicit confidence in the tra-
ditionary tale which I am now to relate : and a
minute examination of it has, by no means, contri-
buted to give it any additional support. I do not,
however, mean to shake the credit of all traditionary
evidence. There is, certainly, a great difference
between traditions ; and some are much more worthy
of credit than others. Where a tradition has been
handed down, by a very industrious and carefid in-
quirer, who has derived it from persons most likely
to be accurately informed concerning the fact related,
and subjoins his authority, such a species of tradition
must always carry great weight along with it.

For the tradition which I am now to mention, we
have no such authority. Our poet, we are told, at
some period in his youth, gave Sir Thomas Lucy, a
gentleman who lived about five miles from Stratford,
such offence, that he was obliged, on this account, to
quit his i?ative country, and to seek a refuge in
London. " He had," says Mr. Rowe, " by a mis-
fortune common enough to young fellows, fallen into
ill company ; and, amongst them, some that made a
frequent practice of deer-stealing, engaged him, more
than once, in robbing a park that belonged to Sir
Thomas Lucy, of Charlecote, near Stratford. For
this, he was prosecuted by that gentleman, as he
thought, somewhat too severely ; and, in order to

120

THE LIFE OF

revenge the ill-usage, he made a ballad upon him.
And though this, probably the first, essay of his
poetry be lost, yet it is said to have been so very
bitter, that it redoubled the prosecution against him,
to that degree, that he was obliged to leave his busi-
ness and family in Warwickshire, for some time, and
shelter himself in London."

Such is the tale which was transmitted to Mr.
Rowe ^, near a century after the death of our author.

5 Probably by Mr. Betterton, who made a journey to Strat-
ford, to collect information respecting our poet. In the manu-
script papers of the late Mr. Oldys, as Mr. Steevens relates,
" it is said that one Boman (' according to Chetwood, p. 143,
an actor more than half an age on the London theatres'), was
unwilling to allow that his associate and contemporary, Better-
ton, had ever undertaken this journey."

This assertion of Mr. Oldys appears to me altogether unworthy
of credit, not that I believe he meant to deceive , but he cer-
tainly must have misapprehended Mr. Boman. Why any doubt
should be insinuated, or entertained, concerning Mr. Betterton's
having visited Stratford, after Rowe's positive assertion that he did
so, it is not easy to conceive. Mr. Rowe did not go there himself ;
and how could he have collected the few circumstances relative
to Shakspeare and his family, which he has told, if he had not
obtained information from some friend, who examined the register
of the parish of Stratford, and made personal inquiries on the
subject ?

" Boman," we are told, *' was unwillhjg to believe,'' &c. But
the fact disputed did not require any exercise of his belief. Mr.
Boman, who died in 1739, near eighty years old, was married to
the daughter of Sir Francis Watson, Bart, the gentleman with
whom Betterton joined in an adventure to the East Indies, whose
name the writer of Betterton's Life, in the Biographia Britannica,
has so studiously concealed. By that unfortunate scheme, Betterton
lost above 2000/. ; Dr. Ratclift'e, 6000/. ; and Sir Francis Watson,
his whole fortune. On his death, soon after the year 1692, Mr.
Betterton generously took his daughter under his protection, and

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 121

There is nothing in which stories of this kind are
more deficient than dates. Their relaters seldom
descend to such minute particulars, for special good
reasons ; or rather, most carefully avoid them ; and
we are generally left, as in the present case, to find out,
as we can, the time when the supposed fact happened.
Allowing, for a moment, its reality, it cannot, with
probability, be supposed to have happened till some
years after our poet's marriage, and after his wife had
borne him three children ; for those children were
born and baptized at Stratford. Sir Thomas Lucy,
and Sir Fulk Greville, the elder, we shall presently
find, were chosen arbitrators, to make an award, in a
suit between our poet's friend, Hamnet Sadler, and
Ananias Nason (a farmer), in January, 1583-4. At
that time, therefore, we may be certain. Sir Thomas
Lucy had not exercised any severity against Shak-
speare ; for, had that been the case, his friend would
not have chosen the knight as an arbitrator, or, if he
was named by his opponent, have submitted to such
a nomination.

Mr. Rowe is, I believe, the first person who has
mentioned this story in print ; but I have found it
noticed, with some exaggeration, among the manu-
script collections of an industrious and very learned
antiquary of the last century, Mr. William Fulman^,

educated her in his house. Here Boman married her; from
which period he continued to live in the most friendly corre-
spondence with Mr. Betterton, and must have known whether he
went to Stratford or not.

^ See an account of him in Wood's Ath. Oxon. ii. 823, edit.
1721. He was born at Penshurst, in Kent, in 1G32, and elected

122

THE LIFE OF

which are preserved in the archives of Corpus Christi
College, in Oxford. Among Mr. Fulman's various
and valuable literary stores, are found some biogra-
phical notices concerning the most eminent English
poets. His researches appear to have been begun
about the year 1670. At his death, which happened
in 1688, he bequeathed his papers to his friend, Mr.
Richard Davies, of Sandford, in Oxfordshire, rector
of Saperton \ in Gloucestershire, and archdeacon of
Lichfield, who made several additions to the labours of
Mr. Fulman ; and, on his death, in the year 1707,
their united collections were given to the college
above-mentioned, by Mr. Wood, executor to Arch-
deacon Davies. Under the article Shakspeare, Mr.
Fulman has left little more than the dates of his birth

a scholar of Corpus Christi College in Being afterwards

ejected by the parliamentarian visitors, he became tutor to the
children of Mr. Peto, of Chesterton, in Warwickshire, where, for
seven years, he found a comfortable retreat during the Usurpa-
tion. After the Restoration, he was elected a fellow of Corpus
Christi College, and was presented by the president and fellows
of his house to the rectory of Moysey Hampton, near Fairford, in
Gloucestershire, where he died (" to the reluctancy," says Wood,
of many learned men ") June 28, 1688. The Life of Charles
the First, which goes under the name of Dr. Richard Perenchief,
was compiled from the papers of this learned man. Having, in
his youth, been amanuensis to Dr. Hammond, The Whole Duty
of Man has been, without sufficient foundation, ascribed to him,
among many others. Anthony Wood derived much information
from him, as appears by several of his letters to Mr. Fulman ;
whose biographical collections he much laments that he was not
permitted to peruse.

7 This place has been celebrated by Pope :

*' From Cots wold hills to Saperton* s fair dale."

Hor. Imit. b. ii. ep. ii.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

123

and death, intending, probably, had he not been pre-
vented, by a fever, which proved fatal to him, to sub-
join, at some future period, such other particulars as
he could collect : but Mr. Davies, who appears to
have possessed none of the sagacity and erudition of
his friend, has added to Fulman's notes, respecting
our poet, that " he was much given to all unlucki-
nesse, in stealing venison and rabbits; particularly
from Sir Lucy [for he did not even know the
knight's Christian name], who had him oft xvhipt,
and sometimes imprisoned, and at last made him
fly his native country, to his great advancement. But
his reveng was so great, that he is his Justice Clod-
pate ; and ^ calls him a great man, and that, in
allusion to his name, bore three lowses rampant for
his arms This addition to Fulman's notes, I be-
lieve, was made about the year 1690.

Sir Thomas Lucy was certainly a man of great
consideration in the county of Warwick, where his
family had been settled for several generations. He
was born early in the year 1532 \ the son of Sir

^ This omission of the personal pronoun was not uncommon
in the last age. See the Essay on the Metre and Phraseology of
Shakspeave and his Contemporaries.

9 Fulman's MSS. vol. xv. article, Shakspeare.

^ The register of Charlecote, not commencing till after the
birth of Sir Thomas Lucy, gives no information on this subject ;
and his tomb is equally silent ; but it appears, from an inquisition
taken at ^Varwick, September 23, 1551, on the death of his
father, William Lucy, that he was of the age of nineteen years,
two months, and upwards, at the time of his father's death, which
happened June 24-, 1551. He was, therefore, born in or before
April, 1532. Esc, 5 Ed. VI. p. 2, n. 89.

124

THE LIFE OF

William Lucy, knight, and the eldest of ten chil-
dren, of whom five were daughters ^ ; and he put
" his unhoused free condition " into that " circum-
scription and confine," which every man, of any sen-
sibility, must prefer to cheerless celibacy, at a still
earlier period than our poet ; having married a rich
heiress, Joice, the daughter of Thomas Acton, of Sut-
ton, in Gloucestershire, Esq. when he was not fifteen
years old'^. In 1558, about seven years after his father's

^ They are all enumerated in the will of his father, William
Lucy; which was made June 23, 1551, the day before his
death.

3 Et predict. Willus Lucye sic de et in predictis maneriis, advo-
caconibus, messuagiis terris, tenementis et cseteris premissis cum
suis pertinent, seisitus existens, in consideracone cujusdam ma-
ritagii inter Thomam Lucye, armigerum, tunc filium et heredem
apparentem dicti Willielmi Lucye et Jocosam adhunc et modo
uxorem ejusdem Thomae, filiam et hseredem Thome Acton nuper
de Sutton in com. Wigorn. armigeri defuncti, tunc habit, et so-
lemnizat. (quse quidem Jocosa in plena vita et setatis sexdecem
annorum et amplius modo existit apud Charlecotte predict.)
Ac etiam pro diversis promissis et agreament. ex parte dicti Thome
Acton cum prefato Willo Lucye fact, tunc vere observat. ; Necnon
in consideracone et per implement, quorundam agreament. et
C******* prefat. Willm. Lucye cum prefat. Thome Acton per-
antea fact, et habit, idem Willus Lucye per cartam suam indentat.
juratoribus predictis super capconem hujus Jnquisitionis in evi-
dens. ostentatam cujus dat. primo die mensis Augusti anno regni
nuper regis Anglise Henrici Octavi tricesimo octavo [154'6] dedit,
concessit, &c. Esc. 5 Ed. VI. p. 2. n. 89.

It is remarkable that Sir Thomas Lucy, in an elaborate epitaph,
which he wrote for his wife, and which I shall hereafter have oc-
casion to quote, says that she was sixty-three when she died,
Feb. 10, 1595-6. If the words relative to her in this inquisition
are cited from the deed of 1546, then she must have been born
in the year 1530, and consequently must have been sixty-six

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 125

death, he rebuilt the family mansion-house, at Charle-
cote ; and, in honour of his royal mistress, Elizabeth, it
may be observed, that it is constructed in the form
of the letter E ; a species of gallantry, in which
Henry the Second, of France, had set him an illus-
trious example, not long before. To repay him for
this testimony of his attachment and loyalty, she
knighted him, in 1565, and honoured him with a
visit, in August, 1572.

In the reign of that queen, ten new parliaments
were summoned. In her third parliament, which
met April 2, 1571 (13 Eliz.), Sir Thomas Lucy, and
John Hubaud, esquire (who was afterwards knighted),
a friend and favourite of the great Earl of Leicester,
represented the county of Warwick. This parlia-
ment, having sat not quite two months, was dis-
solved on the 29th of May. In the following par-
liament, which met May 8, 1572, Sir Thomas Lucy
was not a member ; he, and his former colleague,
being probably defeated, after a contest, by Mr.
William Devereux ^, and Mr. Clement Throckmorton,
a gentleman of considerable property in Warwick-
shire, which he had represented in a preceding par-
liament, assembled in January, 1562-3. The par-
liament of 1572 having continued, in a very unusual

when she died : if they relate to the time of taking the inquisition
(Sept. 23, 1551), she must have been bom some time in the
year 1535, and could not have been more than sixty-one when she
died. This is not the only instance in which I have found tomb-
stones inaccurate.

Mr. Devereux having died soon after his election, Sir John
Hubaud was elected in his room.

126

THE LIFE OF

manner, for nearly eleven years, Sir Thomas Lucy
had not an opportunity of again offering his services
to the county till the year 1584, when he was a
second time elected to represent it, in conjunction
with George Dighy, Esq. This parliament, after
having sat from the 27th of November, 1584, to the
29th of March in the following year, was then pro-
rogued, and never met again ; being dissolved Sep-
tember 14, 1586. Sir Thomas Lucy, therefore,
was probably invested with the dignity of a county
member, at the period when our poet is said to have
incurred his displeasure.

From the parliamentary history of those times, he
appears to have taken an active part in the House of
Commons, in several matters of importance ; and to
have been one of that puritanical party ^, who, about

5 Mr. Strickland, a zealous puritan, or, in the words of my au-
thor, ** a grave and ancient man of great zeal,'' April 6, 1571,
made a long discourse to induce the house to order the preachers
of the gospel to publish a confession of faith, as had been done
at Strasburgh, Frankfort, &c. and to take order to 'purge the
common prayer-book, and free it from certain superstitious cere-
monies, as using the sign of the cross in baptism, &c. He said
Mr. Norton, a member of that house, had a book composed for
the purpose of effecting this kind of reformation, a reformation
which he contended was ** not contrariant, but directly pursuant
to our profession, that is, to have all things brought to purity
of the primitive church and institution of Christ."

Mr. Norton said, that he had such a book, but that it was
not composed by him, but by virtue of an act of parliament,
passed in 1532, by which eight bishops, eight divines, eight
civilians, and eight temporal lawyers, were appointed to make
ecclesiastical constitutions : in consequence of which the work was
undertaken by Dr. Haddon, who composed the scheme or plan of
the book, which was penned by Mr. Cheeke. This book, which

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

127

the middle of the Queen's reign, while they resisted
some unwarrantable extensions of prerogative, began

was printed, was tendered to the house. Whereupon the follow-
ing persons were appointed for the redress of sundry defections in
those matters ; viz. all the Privy Council being members of the
house, Sir Henry Neville, Sir Thomas Thynne, Sir Thomas Lucy,
Mr. Norton, Mr. Strickland, and ten others." Pari. Hist, iv. 105.
D^Etoe's Journ. 156.

In the Journals of the House of Commons this matter is thus
stated :

Veneris, 6 Apr. 1571.

'* Upon a motion for uniformity of religion, and the mention of
certain bills drawn for that purpose the last parliament, and for
redress of sundry defections in those matters, a Committee is by
the House appointed of these following; viz. all the Privy
Council that are of this house, Sir Henry Neville, Sir John
Thynne, Sir Thomas Lucy, Mr. Strickland," &c.

We again find Sir Thomas Lucy united with Mr. Strickland
and Mr. Norton on a subsequent occasion :

"Martis, prima die Maii, 1571.

*' Mr. Attorney-General and Mr. Doctor Huyoke do desire,
from the Lords, that some of this house may attend upon six of
the Lords to-morrow morning at eight of the clock, for conference
touching the bill against priests disguising themselves in serving-
men's apparel ; which is granted ; and thereupon Mr, Treasurer,
Sir Thomas Scotte, Sir Owen Hopton, Sir Thomas Lucye, Sir
Henry Jones, Mr. Servient Manwood, Mr. Clare, Mr. Thomas
Browne, Mr. Norton, Mr. Yelverton, Mr. Strickland, Mr. Moun-
son, and Mr. Thomas Hussey, are appointed for that purpose."
>Com. Journ. 1. 87.

*' The bill for respite of homage, with the bill for coming to
church, and receiving the communion, was sent to the Lords by
M'. Treasurer, M'. Comptroller, M'. Chan', of the Dutchy, M'.
Chan', of the Excheq'. S'. Thomas Smith, S'. Thomas Scotte, S'.
Thomas Lucy, M'. Norton, M'. Yelverton, M'. Strickland, &c.
• 6 May. 1571." Com. Journ, 1, 88.

Towards the close of this session, I find Sir Thomas Lucy joined

128

THE LIFE OF

to broach those republican doctrines, and to attempt
those innovations, which, at a subsequent period,

with many other respectable members, in vindicating the honour
of the House against a charge of corruption.

*' Lunae, vicesimo octavo Maii, 1571.

**A11 the privy council being of this house, S'. Nic'. Arnolde, S'.
Th^ Scott, S^ Thomas Lucy, Sir Humphry Gilbert, M^ Recorder
of London, M'. Mounson, M'. Yelverton, and M'. Wrothe, are upon
some speeches uttered to this house, that some of the members
of this house sh** take money for their voices, appointed to meet
this afternoon in the Starchamber ; and to examine what persons
being members of this house, have taken any fees or rewards for
their voices, in the furtherance or hindrance of any bills offered
into this house ; and then afterwards to make report of the par-
ticularities thereof unto this house accordingly."

** Martis, vicesimo nono Maii, 1571.

" The Comittees for examination of fees or rewards, taken for
voices in the house, do make report. That they cannot learn of
any that hath sold his voice in this house, or any way dealt un-
lawfully, or indirectly, in that behalf ; and thereupon M". Nor-
ton, declaring that he heard that some had him in suspicion that
way, justifieth himself, and is, upon the question, purged by the
voice of the whole house : and their good opinion of him and of
his honest and dutiful dealing and great pains-taking in the ser-
vice of this house, are in very good and acceptable part declared
and affirmed by the like voice of the whole house." Com.Journ.
1. 93.

In the next parliament in which Sir Thomas Lucy sat, on Mon-
day, the 14th of Dec. [1584-] three petitions touching the liberty
of godly preachers, and to exercise and continue their ministeries,
and also for the speedy supply of able and sufficient men into di-
vers places now destitute, and void of the ordinary means of sal-
vation, were offered unto the house; the first by Sir Thomas Lucy,
the second by Sir Edward Dymock, and the third by Mr. Gates,
which were all thereupon read, and further proceedings therein
deferred until a more convenient time. D' Ewe's Journ. p. S39.

These petitions, it should be observed, were drawn up in the
name of the Commons, to be presented to the House of Lords.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

129

after having been duly matured in the detestable
school of Geneva, contributed, under the manage-

What was meant by the liberty of godly preachers, &c. may be
collected from the fourth, sixth, and eighth articles of these pe-
titions :

** 4. Further, that forasmuch as it is prescribed in the form of
ordering ministers, that the bishops with the priests present shall
lay their hands severally upon the heads of every one that re-
ceiveth order, without any mention of any certain number of priests
that shall be present ; and that in a statute made 21 of King H.
the eighth, is affirmed that a bishop must occupy six chaplains at
giving of orders ; it may be considered whether it may be meet to
provide that no bishop slmll ordain any minister of the word and
sacraments hut with the assistance of six other ministers at the
least, and thereto such only be chosen as be of good report for
their life, learned, continually resiant upon their benefices with
cure, and which do give testimony of their cure for the church of
God, by their diligence in teaching and preaching in their charge:
and that the said ministers do testify their presence at the ad-
mission of such ministers by subscription of their hands to some
act, importing the same : and further that this admission be had
and done publickly, and not in any private house or chapel.

'* 6. That it be likewise considered whether for the better as-
surance that none creep into the charge and cures, being men of
corrupt life, or not known diligent, it might be provided that none
be instituted or by collation preferred to any benefice with cure of
souls, or received to be curate in any charge, without some com-
petent notice before given to the parishes where they take charge,
and some reasonable time allowed, wherein it may be lawful to suck
as can discover any defect in conversation of life in the person %vho
is to be so placed as is aforesaid, to come and object the same.

*' 8. Whereas sundry ministers of this realm diligent in their
calling, and of godly conversation and life, have of late years
been grieved with indictments in temporal courts, and molested by
some exercising ecclesiastical jurisdictions, for omitting small
portions or some ceremony prescribed in the book of Common
Prayer, to the great disgrace of their ministry, andimboldening of
men either hardly affected in religion, or void of all zeal to th^

VOL. ir. K

130

THE LIFE OF

ment of a band of wicked and artful hypocrites, to
destroy, at once, the church, the nobility, and even
the monarchy itself He was, however, sturdily at-
tached to his sovereign ^. From a circumstance, re-
same, which also hath ministered no small occasion of discourage-
ment to the forwardness of such as would otherwise enter into
the ministry ; some good and charitable means may be by their
honourable discretions devised, that such ministers as in the pub-
lick service of the church, and in the administration of the sacra-
ments, do use the book of common prayer allowed by the statutes
of this realm and none other, be not from henceforth called to
question for omission or change of some portion or rite as is afore-
said, so their doings therein be void of contempt."

^ On Tuesday, Feb. 23, 1584-5, upon a motion began by Sir
Thomas Lucy, and continued [i. e. seconded] by Sir Thomas
Moore, that those of this house which are of her Majesties Privy
Council, may in the name of this whole house be humble suitors
unto her Majesty, that, forasmuch as that villainous traitor. Parry,
was a member of this house in the time of some of his most hor-
rible and traiterous cons})iracies and attempts against her Ma-
jesties most royal person (whom Almighty God long preserve)
her Majesty would vouchsafe to give licence to this house, for
that many are of the fellowship of the Association, to proceed to
the devising and making of some law for his execution after his
conviction, as may be thought fittest for his so extraordinary and
horrible treason : It was resolved that those of this house being
of her Majesties most honourable Privy Council, and now present
at this motion, to wit, M^ Treasurer and M^ Vice Chamberlain,
shall exhibit the same humble suit of the House unto her Ma-
jesty accordingly at their convenient opportunity." D'Ewes's
Journ, 355.

Sir Thomas Lucy was, without doubt, one of the Associators
above-mentioned. Of the origin of this association, which in our
own time was so happily imitated at a moment when the whole
nation was almost benumbed with the well-founded apprehension
of the horrors of French anarchy, bloodshed, and impiety, being-
introduced into this country by domcstick traitors acting in con-

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 151

corded by Sir Simonds D'Ewes, he appears not to
have confined his cares solely to the promotion of a
godly ministry, but to have extended them to
matters of comparatively slight importance, and to
have been very active in the preservation of the game ^ ;
an activity that gives some colour to the story
already mentioned, and which we shall presently have
occasion to review. He had twice served the office of

cert with the vilest of the human race in France, Camden gives
us the following account :

*' Hinc et ingruentibus undique periculorura rumoribus, ut pra-
vis seditiorum consiliis insidiisque occurreretur, et reginse saluti, a
quo et regnum et religio dependit, consuleretur; plurimi, Leicestrio
auctore, ex omni hominum ordine per Angliam ex communi cha-
ritate, dum non illam sed de ilia timuerunt, se associatione quadam
mutuis votis, subscriptionibus, et sigillis obstrinxerunt, ad eos
omnibus viribus ad mortem usque persequendos qui in reginam
aliquid attentaverint." Annal. ii. 418.

On the next day (February 24-, 1584-5), I find Sir Thomas Lucy,
Sir Philip Sydney, the Lord Russel, Sir Walter Raleigh, Sir
Thomas Cecil, &c. composing a committee to consider in what
measure and manner they should supply her majesty by subsidy."

^ " The bill for the preservation of grain and game, was, upon
the second reading, committed to Sir Edward Hobby, Sir John
Tracy, Mr. Lieutenant of the Tower, Sir Henry Nevill, Sir
Thomas Lucy, and others ; and the bill was delivered to the said
Sir Thomas Lucy, who, v/ith the rest, was appointed to meet
this afternoon [March 4, 1584-5], in the parliament house or
parlour of the Middle Temple." D'Etvess Journ. 363.

No act, on this subject, being found among the statutes
enacted this year, it appears that this bill, in some subsequent
stage, was rejected. The purport of it was probably the same as
that of an act passed in the seventh year of King James, c. 11,
entitled " An Act to prevent the Spoil of Corn and Grain, by un-
timely Hawking, and for the better Preservation of Pheasants and
Partridges."

K 2

132

THE LIFE OF

sheriff ; in 1569, for the counties of Warwick and
Leicester (the shrievalty of those two counties being
then united), and in 1578, for his own county. He
was also very particularly connected with the town of
Stratford, which he visited frequently, either as an
arbitrator, to decide controversies between the inha-
bitants, as a commissioner for assessing subsidies, as
a justice of peace at the quarter sessions, or to review
the trained soldiers which the borough was obliged
to furnish for carrying on the Irish war, or for other
purposes. If, therefore, our author was so unfortu-
nate as to offend him, he certainly could afterwards
find no safe or comfortable abiding in his native town,
where he could not escape the constant notice of his
prosecutor.

To form a right judgment on this, as on many
other subjects, it is necessary to take into our con-
sideration the prevalent opinions and practices of the
time. If these be attended to, in the present case,
the act which has been imputed to our poet (with
what propriety we shall presently see), however un-
justifiable, will rather appear in the light of a youth-
ful indiscretion, in which light it is frequently repre-
sented, than as a very criminal offence. That it was
a common practice among the young men of those
days, and, being wholly unmixed with any sordid or
lucrative motive (for the venison thus obtained was
not sold, but freely participated at a convivial board),
was considered merely a juvenile frolick, may be
inferred from a passage in a tract of that age, where
it is classed with the other ordinary levities and
amusements of youth. " Time of recreation," (says a

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 133

writer against stage-plays, in 1599), " is necessarie, I
graunt, and thinke as necessarie for scholars, that are
scholars in deede, as it is for any. Yet in my
opinion it were not fit for them to play at stoole-ball
among wenches, nor at chance or maw with idle
loose companions, nor at trunkes in guile-hals, nor to
danse about May-poles, nor to rifle [ruffle] in ale-
houses, nor to carouse in tavernes, nor to steale
deere, nor to rob orchards^ T In like manner,
Antony Wood, speaking of Dr. John Thornborough,
who was admitted a member of Magdalen College in
Oxford, in 1570, at the age of eighteen, and was
successively bishop of Limerick in Ireland, and
bishop of Bristol and Worcester in England, informs
us, that he and his kinsman, Robert Pinkney,
" seldom studied or gave themselves to their books ;
but," (as is related by Simon Forman ^, then a poor
scholar of the same college, who was chiefly main-
tained by their bounty, and with whom they fre-
quently associated), " spent their time in the fencing-
schools and dancing-schools, in stealing deer and
conies, in hunting the hare, and wooing girls \"
At the time here referred to, Thornborough was a
bachelor of arts, and twenty-two years old.

The following quibbling verses also, written by a
contemporary of our poet, afford another testimony
to the same point :

8 The Overthrow of Stage Plaies, 4to. 1599, p. 23.

9 Afterwards the celebrated astrologer, who died in 1613.
Probably, the passage quoted by Wood is found in one of For-
man's MSS. in the Ashmole Museum, in Oxford.

» Athen. Oxon. i. 371.

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THE LIFE OF

" ON DEARE-STEALING.

" Some colts, (wild-youngsters,) that ne'er broken were,
** Hold it a doughty deed to steal a deare :
" If cleanly they come off, they feast anon :
" And say their pray is good fat venison ;

If otherwise, by them it doth appeare,
" That that which they have stollen, then is deare

It is clear, therefore, that this kind of trespass,
even were it justly imputable to Shakspeare, would

^ Wit's Bedlam, Ep. 93, 8vo. 1617. Written by John Davies,
of Hereford, as appears from a passage in which the author says
he was a native of that town, and a writing-master. That this
kind of juvenile frolick was generally unconnected with any lucra-
tive motive, may also be inferred from the following verses, by the
same author, in his Scourge of Folly, without date, but published
about the year 1611 :

" Of Drusus his deere-huniing,

" Drusus in stealing of a deere was kill'd,
" So dyed;, ere he had his hellyfilVd ;
" Thus, like a flea, in seeking but for food,
" Ere he was full, he lost his life and blood."

How very common the practice of stealing deer formerly was,
may further appear from the following verses of Bishop Corbet,
in his Iter Boreale, which was written at some time between
1614? and 1620. He is describing his fare at an inn, at Flower,
in Northamptonshire, about three miles from Daventry :
Now whether it were providence or luck,
*' Whether the keeper's, or the stealers buck,
*' There we had venison." Poems, p. 2, edit. 1672.
To the same purpose may be cited the following passage in
Fuller's Worthies (Lincolnshire, 102), which shows manifestly
how common deer-stealing continued to be, even to his time
[1658] :

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

135

not leave any very deep stain on his character ; being,
in his time, considered merely as a playful " trick of
youth." Let us now examine the ground on which
he has been charged with it.

From Mr. Davies's account of this transaction, it
should seem that he either thought the trespass,
which, according to him, consisted in purloining not
only venison, but rabbits, was committed at so early
a period of life, that Sir Thomas Lucy could, with
propriety, punish the youthful trespassers by corporal
chastisement ; or, supposing them to have been
adult, that the law inflicted such a punishment. The
former of these suppositions, I have already shown to
be highly improbable ; and the other is equally erro-
neous. By the statute 5 Eliz. ch. 21 ^ it was

" I will insert [says he], a letter of Lady Elizabeth, written to
him [Peregrine Bertie] with her own hand ; and. Reader, deale in
matters of this nature, as vohen venison is set before thee, eat the
one, and read the other, never ashing ivhence either came.''

3 This act was certainly considered an important one, for I find
the bill on which it was founded was either brought in by Mr.
Comptroller of her Majesty's household [Sir Edward Rogers],
or committed to him and others ; and when it passed the Com-
mons, it was carried up to the Lords, by Mr. Secretary Cecil,
afterwards Lord Burghley. Com. Journ. i. 64?-— 68, compared
with D'Ewes, 83.

It appears to have been much contested in its progress ; and in
the different stages of the bill to have assumed different shapes
and titles :

" Jovis. Jan. 24, 1562-3.

*' The bill [for breaking of ponds, and stealing fish and
coneys]." Com. Journ. \. 63.
" Merc. 3. Feb.

*' The bill for robbing of ponds, and stealing of coneys, to be
felony. Mr. Comptroller." Com. Journ. 1. 64.

136

THE LIFE OF

enacted, that if any person, by night or day, break
into or wrongfully enter any park, or other ground.

It is afterwards called " The bill for punishment of unlawful
taking of fish, conies, or deer, out of parks and enclosed grounds."
It was engrossed on the 25th of February. The House divided
on it, bn the 8th of March, and it was carried to the Lords ort
the llth, under the title of *' A Bill to prevent the stealing of
fi&h, deer, or haxvks ; the article of cow/es having, in the pro-
gress of the bill, been omitted, and the punishment of felony,
which was originally proposed, changed' to that mentioned in the
text. On the 29th of March, an additional clause or proviso to
this bill was brought from the Lords, and there was a division on
that proviso, on the 31st of the same month. Com. Journ. i. 71.
This proviso was, without doubt, the second in the Act, which
enables the party aggrieved, on certain conditions, to release the
oifender from his recognizance for his good behaviour.

Thus, we find, this bill was above two months in its progress to
a law, and the session lasted but three; from the 12th of
January to the 10th of the following April.

By a former statute, made about twenty years before,
32 Hen. VIII. ch. 2. (to which this reasonable preamble is pre-
fixed, " Forasmuch as justice and equity requireth that every in-
heritor and possessor of manors, lands, or tenements, within the
realme of England should, according to their estates or posses-
sions, peaceably and quietly have, take, and enjoy the profits,
revenues and commodities of the same, as well in things of plea-
sure, as in things commonly valuable, without injury, rapine, or
other extort wrong to be committed or done to any of them
within or upon the same — "), it was enacted, that if any
person, with his face hid with hood or visor, or with painted face,
or otherwise disguised, to the intent he should not be known^
should steal deer or coniesy in the day-time, in a lavoful park or
warren ; or if any person should steal deer or conies, in a lawful
park or warren, in the night-time, he should be adjudged guilty
of felony of death. But tnis severe act subsisted but seven years,
being repealed by 1 Edward VI. c. 12. Afterwards, it was revived
for three years, by 3 & 4 Edward VI. c. 17 ; again, by the 7th
of the same King, c. 11 ; and once more finally repealed by

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

137

enclosed and used for keeping deer^ before the making
of this statute, or afterwards enclosed, by licence of
the Queen, and hunt, drive out, hurt, or kill, any
deer there, he shall, on conviction, pay to the party
aggrieved treble damages, be imprisoned for three
months, and, after the expiration of that time, find
security for his good abearing for seven years ; the
party aggrieved, however, is empowered, at any time
within the seven years, or before^ to release, at his
pleasure, the said suretyship for good behaviour, the
offender having first satisfied him in damages, and
confessed his fault before the justices in open session.
Corporal correction, therefore, we see, was no part
of the punishment appropriated by law to this
offence.

The penalties of the act of Elizabeth were founded
on a former law, repealed some years before, by which
this offence, in certain cases, was made felony. If
Shakspeare had been indicted on the statute of
Elizabeth, he undoubtedly could easily have found
the security required ; nor could there have been any
difficulty in making a compensation for the damage
done ; but he could not so easily commute the im-
prisonment of his person. Without, however, in-

1 Mar. sess. 1. c. i. Hence, however, it was, that when the bill
was brought in first, in 1562-3, it was proposed to make the
offence felony, and the stealing of conies as criminal as the
stealing of deer.

In the parliament which met in the Hth year of Elizabeth, in
which Sir Thomas Lucy was not a member, another ineffectual
attempt was made to punish the destroyers oi rabbits :

" May 20, 1572. The Bill against hunting, and killing of
conies, the first reading, and rejected:' Com. Journ, 1. 96.

138

THE LIFE OF

forming us whether he was imprisoned or not, the
more modern relator of this anecdote tells us, that
thinking he was prosecuted somewhat too severely,
he revenged himself on his prosecutor hy making a
ballad on him And here, as formerly, we are left to
explore, by conjecture, the date of this early essay of
our poet's muse. If he was indicted, this certainly was
not a likely mode to conciliate the knight of Charle-
cote, and to induce him to release the recognizance for
good behaviour, to which the law entitled him. On
the other hand, if he was only threatened with a
prosecution, a lampoon would not contribute to miti-
gate his adversary's wrath, or to defend the criminal
from its effects. We are, therefore, compelled to
suppose, that our poet did not choose to abide the
consequences of the prosecution ; and, before it could
be commenced, fled from his native comitry, leaving
it to some friend to affix his verses on the park gate
of the lord of Charlecote; for such is the tale which
the late Mr. Oldys, and a Mr. Thomas Wilkes, have
transmitted unto us. According to Mr. Wilkes, the
story is said to have come originally from Mr. Thomas
Jones, a gentleman, who, I find, lived at Turbich, a
village in Worcestershire, about eighteen miles from
Stratford, and died there in 1703, aged upwards of
ninety. " He remembered (vve are told) to have
heard, from several old people of Stratford, the story
of Shakspeare's robbing Sir Thomas Lucy's park ;
and their account (Mr. Wilkes observes) agreed with
Mr. Rowe's; with this addition, that the ballad

4 Rowe's Life of Shakspeave.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 139

written by Shakspeare, against Sir Thomas Lucy,
was stuck upon his park gate ; which exasperating
the knight, he applied to a lawyer, at Warwick, to
proceed against him Mr. Jones, it is added, re-
collected the first stanza of this ballad, which was all
that he could remember of it ; and to Mr. Wilkes,
grandson of the gentleman to whom he repeated it,
we are indebted for this fragment; which was given
to the publick, in 1778, by Mr. Steevens, from the
manuscript collection of the late Mr. Oldys^, to whom

5 It was not known that there were not less than five or six
attorneys at Stratford, at this time. Hence it is that a Warwick
lawyer was introduced on this occasion.

According to this improbable account, our author commits an
offence against a gentleman, who takes no notice of him ; and
then he writes a lampoon on the person whom he has injured,
who becomes so exasperated that he determines to prosecute the
offender. These relaters seem to suppose that our poet acted
on the principle of his own Richard :

" I do the wrong, and first begin to brawl."

^ I have endeavoured to exb'bit what Mr. Capel has left on
this subject, in intelligible language ; but am not sure that I
understand him rightly. As a specimen of his style, I will add his
own words, which the reader will interpret as he can :

*' The writer of his ' Life/ (the first modern) speaks of a ' lost
ballad,' which added fuel, he says^ to ' the knight's before con-
ceived anger,' and * redoubled the prosecution,' and calls the
ballad * the first essay of Shakspeare's poetry : ' one stanza of it
which has the appearance of genuine was put into the editor's
hands many years ago by an ingenious gentleman (grandson of
its preserver) with this account of the way in which it descended
to him. Mr. Thomas Jones who dwelt at Turbich a village in
Worcestershire a few miles from Stratford upon Avon, and died
in the year 1703, aged upwards of ninety, remembered to have
heard from several old people at Stratford the story of Shak-
speare's robbing Sir Thomas Lucy's park, and tiieir account of it

140

THE LIFE OF

also this anecdote was communicated, by a relation of
Mr. Jones. I have since been furnished with the
entire song, which was found in a chest of drawers,

agreed with Mr. Rowe's, with this addition, — that the ballad
written against Sir Thomas by Shakspeare was stuck upon his
park-gate, which exasperated the knight to apply to a lawyer at
Warwick to proceed against him. Mr. Jones had put down in
writing the first stanza of this ballad, which was all he remem-
bered of it, and Mr. Thomas Wilkes (my grandfather) transmitted
it to my father by memory, who also took it down in writing, and
his copy is this [Mr. Capel then gives the first stanza]. An exact
transcript, bating the 0 [Sing o lowsie Lucy] : " to which is
added a note, telling us that " the people of those parts pro-
nounce Lowsie like Lucy.'' *' Mr. Jones of whom we had it
[this stanza] originally was also the hander-down of i^cr^ anecdote
which has been given you in a note upon As You Like It [in Mr.
Capel's commentaries on Shakspeare, in quarto], and of this
anecdote Mr. Wilkes quotes another confirmation in the person of
Mr. Oldys, a late stage antiquarian."

[Query. Of which of these anecdotes does this writer mean
to name Mr. Oldys as the voucher? I suppose of that in As You
Like It ; though the word this, which he has used, should seem
to relate to that which we are now considering.]

As I have not the smallest doubt that the whole of this ballad
is a modern invention, it is hardly worth while to examine the
evidence concerning this first stanza : nor, indeed, is it very easy
to comprehend Mr. Capel's account. He first tells us, that this
stanza was put into his hands, many years ago, by an ingenious
gentleman, grandson of ics preserver. I suppose, "by the inge-
nious gentleman," he means Mr. Thomas Wilkes, whom he
afterwards calls his grandfather. He then tells us, that though
Mr. Jones had put it down in writing, and, we are to presume,
gave it in writing to Mr. Wilkes, that gentleman transmitted it to
his [Mr. Capel's] father hy memory ; and from his father's •written
copy, thus founded on a memorial copy, he gives it to his readers,
though he has previously told them that, many years ago, a writ-
ten co|ry was put into his hands by the grandson of the preserver

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 141

that formerly belonged to Mrs. Dorothy Tyler of
Shottery, near Stratford, who died in 1778, at the
age of eighty, and which I shall insert in the Ap-
pendix ; being fully persuaded that one part of this
ballad is just as genuine as the other; that is, that the
whole is a forgery. The greater part of it is evidently

of this rarity, which, being one step nearer the original, should
seem to carry with it more authority.

I may add, that the other anecdote, which is said to be also
derived from Mr. Jones [that one of Shakspeare's brothers lived
till after the Restoration, and recollected having seen our poet
play the part of Adam, in As You Like It], is utterly impossible
to be true, as I shall show in its proper place. So much for Mr.
Capel's account of these verses.

Mr. Oldys thus introduces the stanza of this ballad preserved
by him, which corresponds exactly with Mr. Capel's copy :

** There was a very aged gentleman living in the neighbour-
hood of Stratford (where he died fifty years since), who had not
only heard from several old people in that town of Shakspeare's
transgression, but could remember the first stanza of that bitter
ballad, which, repeating to one of his acquaintance, he preserved
it in writing, and here it is, neither better nor worse, but faith-
fully transcribed from the copy, which his relation very courte-
ously communicated to me :

" A parliemente member, a justice of peace.

At home a poor scare-crowe, at London an asse,
" If lowsie is Lucy, as some volke miscalle it,
** Then Lucy is lowsie whatever befall it :
" He thinks himself greate,
" Yet an asse in his state
" We allowe by his ears but with asses to mate.
" If Lucy is lowsie, as some volke miscalle it.
Sing lowsie Lucy, whatever befall it."

7 She was sister to Samuel Tyler, Esquire, who purchased an
estate, at Shottery, from the heir of Mr. Richard Quiney of
London, and died at Shottery, in June, 1763, aged seventy.

THE LIFE OF

formed on various passages in the first scene of The
Merry Wives of Windsor, which certainly afford
ground for believing that our author, on some account
or other, had not the most profound respect for Sir
Thomas Lucy. The dozen white luces, however,
which Shallow is made to commend as " a good coat,"
was not Sir Thomas Lucy's coat of arms ; though Mr.
Theobald asserts that it is found on the monument of
one of the family, as represented by Dugdale. No
such coat certainly is found, either in Dugdale's Anti-
quities of Warwickshire, or in the church of Charle-
cote, where I, in vain, sought for it. It is probable
that the deviation from the real coat of the Lucies,
which was gules, three lucies hariant, argent ^, was

8 It is remarkable, that the seal used by Sir Thomas Lucy,
was not that which is placed over his tomb^ and which all the
heralds have ascribed to his family, " gules, three Lucies
hariant argent," but three of the same little fishes braced or
entwined i similar, in this respect, to a coat assigned to another
ancient family. See Kerne's Blazon of Gentrie, 4to. 1584',
p. 232. ^' This [the shield in the margin] you will confess to
agree with tlie name ; and yet it is honourable as may be. It
is the coat of Geffrey Lord Lucy. He did bear gules, three
lucies hariant, argent."

In a subsequent page, the same author adds, *' In like man-
ner, Troutbeck hath taken up three trouts, whose coat, for the
order of bearing the charge, I will set before your face, in this
scutcheon. This shield is azure, three trouts braced i?i triangles
argent, borne by the name of Troutbeck."

A similar conceit may be observed in the arms of the Arundel
family, which are sable, six stvallotvs argent. In like manner,
the family of Roche, who were Viscounts Fermoy, in Ireland,
bore three roches in their arms.

The quibble in the first scene of The Merry Wives of Windsor,
without question, was intended to allude to the arms of Sir

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

143

intentionally made by our poet, that the application
might not be too direct, and give offence to Sir
Thomas Lucy's son, who, when this play was written,
was living ^, and much respected, at Stratford.

Other attempts have been made to recover this
much sought-for ballad ; and, if we are to believe the
author of a Manuscript History of the Stage, full of
forgeries and falsehoods of various kinds \ which I

Thomas Lucy, and the pronunciation of the time aided the allu-
sion. LoiKsy, I have no doubt, was pronounced, as it is yet in
Scotland, Loozy ; and the name of Lucy^ as pronounced in
Warwickshire {Loosy\ had a very similar sound.

In allusion to this coat of arms, and to his surname, Dr,
William Lucy (grandson to Shakspeare's Sir Thomas Lucy), who
finally became Bishop of St. David's, published in 1657, *' Ob-
servations, &c, on Hobbes's Leviathan," under the disguised
name of Christopher Pike ; on which Waller very gravely ob-
serves, that "no Englishman, who had not dabbled into Latin,
would have changed so good a name as Lucy into that of a fish."
But we see, the Bishop did not need to have recourse to the
Latin, luchis ; the language of heraldry, at least, furnished him
the same word anglicised.

9 Sir Thomas Lucy, the elder, the supposed prosecutor of
Shakspeare, died at Charlecote, in the year 1600, as appears
from the following entry in the register of that parish :

" Sir Thomas Lucy, Knight, departed this life the 6th day of
July, 1600, and was buried the 16th of the same month."

He was, therefore, at his death, in the sixty-ninth year of his
age [see the note quoted in p. 123]. In the inquisition taken
upon his death, at Warwick, September 26, 4-3 Eliz. 1601, he is
said to have died on the 7th of July ; and so says his funeral cer-
tificate, authenticated by his son. The same inquisition states
that his son. Sir Thomas, was, at the time of taking it, forty-
three years old, and upwards. Esc. 43 Eliz. p. 6. n. 7.

* William Chetwood, formerly prompter of Drury Lane theatre,
the unblushing fabricator of numerous unseen and non-existing

144

THE LIFE OF

perused some years ago, two stanzas of it were
rescued from oblivion by the learned Joshua Barnes,
from a songstress in Stratford, about the year 1690.
The writer of these spurious verses, which are given
below, unluckily did not know that the wife of Sir
Thomas Lucy, whom he has represented as a wanton,
was a lady of the most exemplary piety and virtue ;
and that a very high eulogy on her excellent qua-
lities is yet to be seen in the church of Charlecote,
written, as the author of it has mentioned, " by him
who knew her best ; " without doubt, her husband,
who has particularly praised her for her exemption

editions of Shakspeare's plays, of which he published a fictitious
catalogue, in 1751, while he was in the Marshalsea of Dublin,
was, I suspect, the author of this Manuscript History of the
Stage, which, from some circumstances mentioned in it, ap-
pears to have been written some time between April, 1727, and
October, 1730. The passage alluded to is as follows:

*' Here we shall observe, that the learned Mr. Joshua Barnes,
late Greek Professor of the University of Cambridge, baiting about
forty years ago at an inn in Stratford, and hearing an old woman
singing part of the above-said song, such was his respect for Mr.
Shakspeare's genius, that he gave her a new gown for the two
following stanzas in it ; and, could she have said it all, he would
(as he often said in company, when any discourse \ms casually
^rose about him) have given her ten guineas :

** Sir Thomas was too covetous,

** To covet so much deer,
" When horns enough upon his head

*' Most plainly did appear.

" Had not his worship one deer left?

" What then ? He had a wife
*^ Took pains enough to find him horns

^' Should last him during life."

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 145

" from any crime or vice," and for " her love and
truth, and faithfuU adherence to her marriage
vows^."

But to this, which has passed current for above a
century, and to all the circumstantial evidence by
which it seems to be supported, I have a very plain
tale to oppose. I conceive it will very readily be
granted that Sir Thomas Lucy could not lose that of
which he never was possessed ; that from him who is
not master of any deer, no deer could be stolen. It
is agreed, that there never was a park at Charlecote ;
and, if the knight never eat any venison but what
came out of the park of Fulbroke, he certainly never
partook of that delicacy ; for he never was possessed
of Fulbroke, nor was it enclosed in his time ; having

^ In the church of Charlecote is the following inscription, in
honour of this lady :

" Here entombed lyeth the Lady Joyce Lucy, wife of Sir
Thomas Lucy of Charlecote in the county of Warwick, Knight,
daughter and heir of Thomas Acton of Sutton in the county of
Worcester, who departed out of this wretched world to her
heavenly kingdome, the 10* day of Feb'', in the year of our Lord
God 1595 [1595-6], and of her age Ix and three: All the time
of her life a true and faithful servant of her good God ; never de-
tected of any crime or vice ; in religion — most sound, in love to
her husband most faithful and true ; in friendship most constant ;
to what in trust was committed to her, most secret : in wisdom
excelling ; in governing her house and bringing up of youth in
the fear of God, that did converse with her, most rare, and sin-
gular. A great maintainer of hospitality ; greatly esteemed of
her betters ; misliked of none unless of the envious. When all
is spoken that can be said, a woman so furnished and garnished
with virtue, as not to be bettered, and hardly to be equalled of
any. As she lived most virtuously, so she dyed most godly.

" Set down by him that best did know what hath been written
to be true, Thomas Lucy."

VOL. II. L

146

THE LIFE OF

been disparked before he arrived at the age of man-
hood, in which state it continued during the whole of
his life. In the first year of King Edward VI. John
Dudley, Earl of Warwick, obtained a grant of the
inheritance of this park; and on his attainder
1 Mar. the Queen [March 8, 1554-5] gave the
pannage and herbage of it to Sir Francis Englefield,
who was one of her principal favourites, and Master
of the Court of Wards ; and, a few years afterwards
(4 & 5 Ph. & M.), she granted him the reversion
of this disparked park (for so it is, again and again,
expressly called), to hold of herself in capite. In
the first year of Elizabeth, Sir Francis Englefield
went into foreign parts ; from whence, I believe, he
never returned. Being a Roman Catholick, and
leagued with the enemies of the Queen on the throne,
on the 27th of March, in the thirteenth year of her
reign [1571], a commission was issued, to seize all
such lands as belonged to him into the Queen's hands.
Whether he had, before that time, passed from him
the disparked grounds of Fulbroke, I have not been
able to ascertain ; but, however that may be, they
assuredly were not purchased by our Sir Thomas
Lucy, nor was he ever possessed of them ; as appears
by the inquisition taken at Warwick, after his death
[September 26, 1601], which recites all the lands of
which he was seized, in the county of Warwick and
elsewhere, and does not mention Fulbroke. Neither
was his son. Sir Thomas Lucy, who survived his
father but five years, ever possessed of this manor.
The fact is, that it was purchased some time in the
reign of James the First, by Sir Thomas Lucy,
grandson of our Sir Thomas, who, as Dugdale has

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

147

truly stated, renewed the park, which, as we have
seen, from the year 1554, had heen disparked and
unenclosed, and, hy the addition of Hampton Woods,
enlarged it considerably.

In further confirmation of what I have now stated,
it may be observed, that, though Sir Thomas Lucy
lived on a very amicable footing with the corporation
of Stratford, we never find any notice of their re-
ceiving a buck from him, which they undoubtedly
would have done, had he been possessed of a park so
near them. To Sir John Hubaud, who lived at
Ipsley, not many miles from Stratford, and to Sir
Fulke Greville, the elder, of Beauchamps Court,
near Alcetor, and his son (afterwards Lord Broke),
to these gentlemen alone, from 1576 to the year
1600, they appear to have been indebted for their
venison feasts.

If, after all, it shall be said that Sir Thomas Lucy,
though he had no park either at Charlecote, might
yet, without any royal leave, have had some deer in
his grounds, and that still our poet may have been
guilty of the trespass which has been imputed to him,
the objector must be told that no such grounds ^
were protected by the common law, every one
having right to kill thereon all beasts of chase as
ferce natures ; and that the penalties of the statute

3 ** A park is an enclosed chace, extending only over a man's
own grounds. The word park, indeed, properly signifies an en-
closure : but yet it is not every field or common, which a gentle-
man chuses to surround with a wall or paling, and to stock with
a herd of deer, that is thereby constituted a legal park ; for the
king's grant, or, at least, immemorial prescription, is necessary to
make it so." Blackstone, ii. 38.

L 2

148

THE LIFE OF

of Elizabeth, already mentioned*, as well as preceding
statutes on this subject, extended only to offences
committed in a legal park, our author, had he even
been guilty of the act imputed to him, would not have
fallen within the peril of the law. He might, indeed,
have been proceeded against by an action of trespass ;
but it never has been alleged that any civil suit was
instituted against Shakspeare on this ground. In
truth, the objection which I have now stated is
scarcely worth considering ; for of keeping deer in
unenclosed grounds no example can be produced.

That there never was a park at Charlecote, is very
easily proved. It is well known that, from the time
of the Norman conquest, in consequence of the prin-
ciple of the feudal law, that the king is the ultimate
proprietor of all the lands of the kingdom, which are
all considered as derived from him, and of his right by
the common law, and by virtue of his royal preroga-
tive, to all bona 'vacantia, which all beasts of chase
are supposed to be, no person could possess a legal
park but by royal licence, or immemorial prescrip-
tion. Hence it follows that, strictly speaking, no
man was entitled, at common law, to hunt or sport
even upon his own soil. By the grant of a chase
licence to make a park or free warren, becoming, as
Sir William Blackstone has well expressed it, a royal
game-keeper, he obtained not only the power, but
the sole and exclusive power of killing all beasts of
venery, and all fowls of warren, so far as his chase,
park, or warren, extended ; and it was unlawftil, at
common law, for any other person to kiU any beasts

4 See p. 135.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

149

of chase, or fowls of warren, within its precincts.
Leland, whose journeys through England, as has
been already mentioned, were made between the
years 1536 and 1542, never fails to take notice of
every park that he passed by ; but does not mention
any park belonging to the Lucy family, though he
rode by the mansion-house and demesne of Sir
William Lucy, the father of Sir Thomas, which he
has briefly described in his journey from Warwick to
Stratford : Charlecote, therefore, certainly could not
boast of any park by prescription or immemorial
usage. If it shall be said that his son, Sir Thomas
Lucy, at a subsequent period, might have made a
park there, the answer is, that this could not have
been done without a royal grant or licence : and it
appears that he never did obtain any such franchise ;
no trace of such a grant being to be found on the
patent rolls, during the whole reign of Elizabeth.

SECTION IX.
When our poet's mind was first applied to theatrical
subjects, is a curious speculation, on which, however, I
am not furnished with sufficient documents to warrant
any certain conclusion. At what time soever he re-
moved from Stratford, he certainly had an opportu-
nity of observing many modes of life in his native
town, and his resolution to tread the stage might have
been formed before he had ever seen London. While
he was yet a child, so early as 1569, the year when his
father was chief magistrate, the Queen's company of
comedians, and the Earl of Worcester's servants, visited
Stratford; in 1573, Lord Leicester's pliyers were

150

THE LIFE OF

there ; in tlie following year the comedians of Lord
* Warwick, and those of Lord Worcester; and in 1576
the latter company and Lord Leicester's servants again
visited that town ^ In the period between 1579,
when our poet was fifteen years old, and 1587, in
which, or the preceding year, he may be supposed to
have migrated to the metropolis, some distinguished
company of players entertained the inhabitants of
Stratford and its neighbourhood, by their dramatick
exhibitions every year but one ; Lord Strange's ser-
vants, and the company licensed by the Countess
Dowager of Essex, in 1579 ; Lord Derby's servants, in
1580; Lord Worcester's andLord Berkeley's, in 1581;
Lord Worcester's alone, in 1582; the servants of Lord
Berkeley and Lord Chandois, in 1583 ; the servants of
Lord Oxford, Lord Warwick, and Lord Essex, in
1584; and a company of which the name is not speci-
fied, in 1586. In the following year, no less than four
different companies of comedians visited this tovm,
among which were her Majesty's servants ^.

5 In the chamberlain's account for 1569, I find the following
articles :

" Item, payd to the Quenes pleyers, ixs.
*' Item, payd to the erle of Worcesters pleers, xudr
In 1573—" Item, p'' to Mr. Bayly for the Erie of Leicesters
players, vi5. \md"

In 1574- — Given my lord of Warwicks players, xvii^.
" P** the earle of Worcesters plavers, v^. vud:*
In 1577, " P'' to my lord of Leicesters players, xv^.
*' P"* to my lord of Wosters players, iij.?. iiijW."

6 1579. " Item paid to my Lord Strange men the xi"' day of
February at the comaundement of M"" Bayliffe, vs.

" P** at the comandement of M' Baliffe to the countys of
Essex plears, xiv5. v'ld."

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 161

The usual place of representation appears to have
been the Guildhall, which seems somewhat extraordi-
nary, as perhaps no town in England had in it at
that time more barns, any one of which should seem
to have been better adapted to such exhibitions than
the chamber or guildhall, and would certainly have
held a more numerous audience. During several of
the following years, with which we have less concern,

1510. ** P"^ to the earle of Darbyes players at the comaunde-
ment of M' Baliffe, viii^. ivd."

1581. *' P'' to the earl of Worcester his players, iij^. iiijW.
" P** to the Lord Bartlett his players, iij^. ijo?."

\_Bartley was often written formerly for Berkeley.']
Thus, in Dugdale's Chronica Series, p. 105, we have " Robert
Bartley similiter, 28 Feb. Pat. 2 Car. p. 15 ; " and in the next
page but one, the same person is called Robert Barlcley :

" Rob. Barkley constit. serv. regis ad legem, 12 April, Pat.
3 Car. p. 8."

1582. " Payed to Henry Russel for the earle of Worcesters
players, V5."

1583. " Payd to M' Alderman that he layd downe to the
Lord Bartlitte his players, vs.

" P** to the Lord Shandowes players, iii^. iit/.'*

1584'. '* Geven to my lord of Oxfords pleers, iij^. iiijflf.

Geven to the earle of Warr. pleers, iij^. iiijc?.
** P'' to the earle of Essex pleers, iij^. viijc?."

1586. " P'' to M"^ Tiler for the pleyers, V5."

1587. *' Item, p^ for mending of a forme that was broken by
the Queues players, xvic?.

" Item, Gyven to the Queues players, xx^.

" It. Gyven to my lord of Essex players, vs.

** It. Gyven to therle of Leycester his players, xs.

" It. Gyven to another companye, iiijs. iiij</.

** It. gyven to my lord of Staffords men, iijs. iiijc?."

Accounts of the chamberlains of Stratford in
the respective years.

162

THE LIFE OF

various companies of players occasionally visited Strat-
ford^. At length, at the very end of the Queen's
reign, this town appears to have been infected by the
new and illiberal doctrines of puritanism, which after-
wards overturned the church and state, and banished
every art and every elegance from England. Before,
however, the dominion of the Saints was completely
established, their disciples at Stratford were able to
procure the following anathema to be issued out by
the corporation, against the itinerant sons of Thespis :
" 17 Dec. 45 Eliz. 1602.
" At this Hall yt is ordered, that there shall be no

7 1592. " Paid to the Queenes players, xx5." The account of
Henry Wilson^ chamberlain for 1592.

1593. " Paid unto the Queenes players, xx5." Account of
John Sadler for 1593.

1596. " July 16 and 17, paid the Queens plairs, X5." Memo-
randum made by Richard Quiney at the end of a paper con-
taining an account of the charges of his journey to London in
that year.

It appears by another memorandum on the same paper, that
Lord Derby's and Lord Ogle's servants also visited Stratford in
that year.

1597. ** Item, p'' for four company of players, xix^. iiijfl?.'*
Account of John Smith, chamberlain for 1597.

At Stratford, hovi^ever, v^rhat old Ben complains of in his
Discoveries, vt^as experienced as well as at London, and '* the
puppets were seen in spight of the players," as appears by an
item in the account of 1597 : *' Item, P** to a man at Mr. Lewis
by the appointment of Mr. Sturley then Bailiffe for the Shotv of
the citie of Norvoiche, \\\s. \\\]d"

So also in the chamberlain's account for 1583 :

** Payd to Davi Jones and his companye for his pastyme at
Whitsontyde, xiii^. iiiic?."

Davy Jones was an inhabitant of Stratford.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 153

plays or interludes played in the chamber, the guild-
hall, nor in any parte of the howse or courte, from
hensforward, upon payne that whoever of the baylief,
aldermen, or burgesses of the boroughe shall gyve
leave or license thereunto, shall forfeyt for everie
offence — x^.^ "

In consequence of this order, during the whole
reign of James the First, I have found but two the-
atrical performances at Stratford ; and at length the
puritanical zeal went so far, that in the year 1622
the king's players were paid for not playing in the
haU^.

In his native town, as I have already observed,
Shakspeare had an opportunity of seeing a good deal
of life in miniature, and many of those objects which
he afterwards delineated with such a masterly hand.
Stratford was by no means so inconsiderable a town,
even in his time, as I believe it has been generally
supposed. Camden, in 1586, calls it emporiolum non
inelegans; and at a still earlier period it is represented
as " one of the fairest market towns in Warwickshire."

8 Registr. Burg. Stratf. B.

9 The account of Richard Robins, chamberlain for the year
1622. The sum paid to the King's company for depriving the
town of the entertainment which these comedians meant to have
given, was only six shillings.

We find the same puritanical disposition in other places about
this period. So in an account of the chamberlains of Kingston
upon Thames, in 1621 : ** P** by M' Bailiff to a company of
Players, because they should not play in the Townhall, Ol. \0s. Od.'*
See Lysons's Environs of London, i. 234«.

Again, in 1625 : ** To the Kings Players, because they should
not play in the Townhall nor in the towne, for Jive yeares,
01. 10s. Oc?." Ibid.

164

THE LIFE OF

The number of houses was, I believe, not less than
three hundred in the early part of the reign of Eliza-
beth ; in the parish, which, we have already seen, was
in circuit fourteen miles, there were " fifteen hundred
houseling people," that is, persons who received the
communion, before she ascended the throne ; and in
1590 the parish was supposed to contain three thou-
sand souls. They had two great fairs every year, to
which many persons from the adjoining counties re-
paired. Though the charter did not invest the cor-
poration with the power of holding courts-leet, they
exercised this and several other rights by prescription,
with the sanction of the lord of the manor, Ambrose,
Earl of Warwick, who frequently made them a per-
sonal visit ^ ; and at Easter and Michaelmas every
year their court-leet sat. The leet was usually held
at the college mansion-house ^, of which some account

1 t« pa ^j^g chardges at the Swanne the fyrste of October,
when my Lorde of Warrwick was here, xii^. \\\]d.

Payed to Willyam Smyth for halfe a pound of sugar y* was
geven to my Lord when he was here, \d.

*' Payed for an oxe for my Lord of Warr. vii/. xi^. Od,

*' Payed for grass and dryving of the same oxe, ii*."

Account of Tho7nas Gordayne, chamberlain for 1582.

" P^ John Smith upon his bill for wyne bestowed upon my
Lord of Warricke, xi^. y\\\d.

*' Item for a pottel of claret wyne a pottel of sacke and half a
pound of sugar for my lords officers at ilie grete Leet, u}s. id.''

Account of Richard Courte,from Mich. 1583, to Mich. 1584.

In the chamberlain's account for 1576, I find this entry :

*' Paid for candells the Lete court day at night, iiijr/."

^ " Item paied for wyne to the Colledge when the Leight
[Leet] was, vs." Account of John Taylor and Anthony Tanner^
chamberlains for 1578.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

155

already has been given. They had, we have seen, a
court of justice, which sat every fortnight in the year,
and was attended by several skilful attorneys, some of
whom resided in the town. They were frequently
visited by the principal justices of peace for the county,

*' Payd for a pottel of clarett, and pottel of sacke and half a
pound of suger to my lords officers at the Lyght [Leet], iii^. ud.''
Account of Richard Courte from Mich. 1582, to Mich, 1583.

Again, in the account for the year 1585:

" Paide for one gallant of clarett wine sent to my Lords offi-
cers when they kept the Lete, ijs.

'* One pottle of sacke, xvid.

** Sugar halfe a lb. ixo?.

*' Paide for wine sent to my Lo. his officers at the Lete after
Michaelmas, one pottle of sacke, xv'id,
** One pottle of claret wyne, xiid,
"Sugar, halfe a lb. ixdr
In the account for 1586 :

" P** for ij quarts of clarett wyne and a quart of sack at the
Lete in April, ijs. v\d.

" P"^ for half a pound of sugar, v'md.
P*^ to M' Baililfe for wine and sugar that he gave to my Lo.
his [my Lord's] Steward, ij^. \}d."

In the account for 1587 :

** Item for wyne and sugar bestowed upon my Lord of Warr.
hys Steward at the two Letes, iiijs. id.''

Again, in 1588 :

It. for wyne and sugar the 21 of April bestowed on the
Steward of the Lete, xwid.

** It. for wyne and sugar bestowed upon hym at the Lete in
October, 1588, xxiic?."

The leet was, however, sometimes held at one of the principal
inns, as appears by the account of John Smith, chamberlain for
the year 1601 :

*' Paid for a potell of claret wyn and a quart of sacke at the
Swafie when M' Ballye did dynner with Fauster at the Beare,
at the great Leat there then kept, ij^. uijd."

156

THE LIFE OF

(Sir Fulke Greville the elder, Sir Thomas Lucy, Sir
John Harrington, Mr. Ralph Verney, Mr. Clement
Throckmorton, Mr. Henry Goodeere, Mr. Roger Bur-
goyne, &c.) as reviewers of the trained men, as com-
missioners of subsidy ^, and at the quarter sessions ^ ;
who, without doubt, furnished the admiring crowd
with many " wise saws and modem instances." In
consequence of the criminal jurisdiction of theleet and
sessions, they had stocks, a pillory, and a gaol ^ ; in
which our poet could not fail of finding a wild
Half can,'' and some " rapier-and-dagger men : " while

3 See Appendix.

♦ " 1587. It. payd by M' JefFeries for the fyne and for the fees
for a presentment of a highe wey at the Quarter Sessions, X5. y'md.

'* 1604<. for lyme to mend the guildhall before the Quarter
Sessions, Sep. xxviii. ix^f.

" P*^ for ij bottles of claret wyne bestowed on the Justices at
the Quarter Sessions, Octob. 2. ij^.

** It. to Heminge [the Beadle] for candles used at the Quarter
Sessions, \d.

" 1570. Item paid to Humphrey Getley for mending of the
stoxe, \\\d,

" 1566. Item paid to M' Tyler towardes the reparacon of the
Pyllorie, xviij^. vie?.

*' 1583. to Richard Cowell for mending the pillory and
gunne stooles, y\\d.

** 1580. to Richard Hornbie for lincks and staples to make
fast the prisoners, \\\d.

" 1592. P** the iij day of Julie to Richard Waterman for a sill
for the Guile hall, iij^."

Chamberlain's Accounts for the respective years.

s The gaol was in Bridge-street, as appears from a memorandum
in A Survey of the estate of the corporation made 24 Nov.
1582: " The Jayle haull lacketh a syll on the syde towards Trowt's
house." Trowt, who was a butcher, lived in Bridge -street.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 157

the annual muster of the trained soldiers could not
but exhibit Mouldy s, Bullcalfs, and Peebles, in abun-
dance.

Supposing this extraordinary man to have left
Stratford, from whatsoever cause, about the year 1586
or 1587, it is now our business to attend him to the
metropolis. And here we are presented with another
anecdote concerning him, to which, in my apprehen-
sion, no credit ought to be given.

" In the time of Elizabeth (says Dr. Johnson),
coaches being yet uncommon, and hired coaches not at
all in use, those who were too proud, too tender, or too
idle to walk, went on horseback to any distant busi-
ness or diversion. Many came on horseback to the
play ; and when Shakspeare fled to London from the
terror of a criminal prosecution, his first expedient
was to wait at the door of the playhouse, and hold the
horses of those that had no servants, that they might
be ready again after the performance. In this office
he became so conspicuous for his care and readiness,
that in a short time every man as he alighted called
for Will. Shakspeare, and scarcely any other waiter
was trusted with a horse, while Will. Shakspeare
could be had. This was the first dawn of better for-
tune. Shakspeare, finding more horses put into his
hand than he could hold, hired boys to wait under
his inspection, who, when Will. Shakspeare was sum-
moned, were immediately to present themselves, / am
Shakspeare's boy. Sir. In time Shakspeare found
y higher employment ; but as long as the practice of
riding to the playhouse continued, the waiters that
held the horses retained the appellation of Shakspeare' s
boysP

158

THE LIFE OP

The genealogy of this story, it must be acknow-
ledged, is very correctly deduced. It first appeared
in print in The Lives of the English Poets, published
in 1753, under the name of Mr. Cibber. " Sir Wil-
liam D'Avenant (says the author of that book) told
it to Mr. Betterton, who communicated it to Mr.
Rowe ; Mr. Rowe told it to Mr. Pope, and Mr. Pope
told it to Dr. Newton, the late editor of Milton ; and
from a gentleman who heard it from him, 'tis here re-
lated This gentleman, without doubt, was Dr.
Johnson, who was a school-fellow of Bishop Newton's,
and has himself introduced the anecdote in his edition
of Shakspeare, published in 1765, and whose amanu-
ensis, Mr. Robert Shiels, had a considerable share in
the compilation above-mentioned \ We have here cer-

^ Gibber's Lives of the Poets, vol. i. p. 130.

7 As this anecdote does not stand on the authority of Mr.
Shiels, or Mr. Theophilus Cibber, the person here meant, it is
unnecessary to enter into any disquisition concerning their re-
spective claims to the work here quoted. However, as this curious
circumstance of literary history has been involved in some con-
fusion, it may not be improper to make some observations upon it.
It is observable that Dr. Johnson told Mr. Boswell, " that the work
was entirely composed by Mr. Shiels. The booksellers (he added)
gave Theophilus Cibber, who was then in prison, ten guineas to
allow Mr. Cibber to be put in the title-page as the author: by this
a double imposition was intended ; in the first place, that it was
the work of a Cibber at all, and in the second place, that it was
the work of old Cibber." Bostvell's Life of Johnson, 8vo. ii. 392.

Mr. Boswell adds, that Dr. Johnson has given the same account
in his Life of Hammond, where he sayS, " the manuscript of Shiels
is now in my possession."

The writer of an article in the Monthly Review for May, 1792,
has strenuously endeavoured to refute this statement. " The al-
leged design of making the compilement pass for the work of old

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

159

tainly a very fair pedigree ; notwithstanding which,
I am utterly incredulous with respect to this first in-
troduction of our poet to theatrical reputation. I do

Mr. Gibber (he asserts) is founded on an uncharitable construc-
tion, no such thought being harboured either by the proprietors
or first designer of the work." To this, on the part of Dr. John-
son, it is only necessary to reply, that the thoughts or intentions
of men are inscrutable; we can only judge of them by their ac-
tions. With what possible view could the name of Mr. Gibber be
put to this work, but that it should be supposed to be the produc-
tion of the father, who was known throughout England by that de-
signation, and not that of his son, with whom for more than twenty
years the publick had been acquainted by the title of Theopkilus
Gibber; and who during his father's life-time had no title to the
designation here given him ?

** The materials for this work (according to the same anony-
mous writer's account) were collected and digested by Mr. Shiels,
for which he was paid seventy pounds ; but his work was revised
and corrected in the proof sheets, by Theophilus Gibber, who
added some new lives and notes, and received for his trouble
twenty guineas in the first instance, and at a subsequent period
some additional sum ; and soo7i afterwards (we are further told)
embarked for Dublin, but the ship was cast away, and every per-
son on board perished." He embarked for Dublin five or six
years after this transaction, in the year 1758. I do not perceive
any material difference between these two accounts. Mr. Theo-
philus Gibber is, indeed, not here acknowledged to have been in
prison, though, I believe, this was the fact ; and there is a slight
mistake in the sum said by Dr. Johnson to have been paid him ;
nor does Dr. Johnson appear to have been acquainted with his
labours, as a corrector, vamper, and reviser of the printed proof
sheets of Shiels's work ; but his work undoubtedly it originally
was ; and Dr. Johnson had probably perused it in its original form ;
and in that form, it is believed, it was destroyed, with several of
his own manuscripts.

The true state of the case, however, yet remains to be dis-
closed. The fact, I believe, is, that the only valuable additional
information inserted in this work by Theophilus Gibber, was de-

160

THE LIFE OF

not, however, object to this anecdote, because, as has
been suggested by Mr. Steevens, Mr. Rowe, having
omitted to insert it in his Life of Shakspeare, must
therefore be supposed not to have believed it ; for
though he did believe it, he might not think it worth
insertion : nor do I object to it on another ground
taken by Mr. Steevens, who doubts whether it was
then the custom to ride on horseback to the play.
" The most popular of the theatres (says that gentle-
rived from the notes of the late Mr. Oldys and Mr. Coxeter.
** When I left London (says Oldys, in his manuscript notes on
Langbaine) in the year 1724, to reside in Yorkshire, I left in the

care of the Rev. Mr. B 's family, with whom I had several

years lodged, among many other books, goods, &c. a copy of this
Langbaine, in which I had written several notes, and references to
further knowledge of these poets. When I returned to London
in 1730, 1 understood my books had been dispersed ; and after-
wards becoming acquainted with Mr. Coxeter, I found that he
had bought my Langbaine of a bookseller. As he was a great
collector of plays and poetical books, this must have been of ser-
vice to him ; and he has kept it so carefully from my sight, that
I never could have the opportunity of transcribing into this I am
now writing in, the notes I had collected in that. He died on
the 10th of April, being Easter Sunday, 174-7, of a fever, which
grew from a cold caught at an auction of books over Exeter
Change, or by sitting up late at the tavern afterwards."

After Mr. Coxeter's death, his books and MSS. were purchased
by Osborne, the well-known bookseller of Gray's Inn, and were
offered for sale in the year 1748. The book in question. No. 10131,
in Osborne's catalogue for that year, was purchased either by
T. Cibber, or by some bookseller who afterwards put it into his
hands ; and from the notes of Oldys and Coxeter, the principal
part of the additional matter furnished by Cibber for the Lives of
the Poets, was unquestionably derived. Mr. Coxeter's MSS. are
mentioned in the title-page, but Oldys is unnoticed. Probably
the secret history of this business was not then known.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 161

man) were on the Bankside ; and we are told by the
satirical writers of the time, that the usual mode of
conveyance to these places was by water ; but not a
single writer so much as hints at the custom of riding
to them, or at the practice of having horses held dur-
ing the time of the exhibition." — In this and many
other disquisitions, a little attention to dates will save
much trouble. It should be recollected, that we are
now speaking of the year 1586, or 1587, at which
time, though Southwark was not without a theatre,
the most popular playhouses appear to have been that
specifically called the Theatre, which was situated at
Newington Butts, and the Green Curtain in Shore-
ditch ^. To the former of these two theatres in sum-
mer, and to the latter in winter, as well as to the plays
performed by the choir-boys of St. Paul's, and the
representations at the Bull in Bishopsgate-street, the
Cross Keys in Gracechurch-street, and the Bell-Savage
on Ludgate-hill, the spectators were under the neces-

^ The Lord Chamberlain's servants, in which company Shak-
speare first entered himself, performed, till the year 1600, at The
Curtain in Shoreditch. See The History of the Stage, vol. iii.
There had been a theatre in Whitefriars, but it was pulled down
before the period we are now speaking of.

In a sermon preached by John Stockwood in 1578, the preacher,
computing the whole sum made by the theatre in a year, speaks of
eight places for stage exhibitions in the city. As his object was
to aggravate the mischief arising from plays, he undoubtedly
would not have left Southwark out of his account, had there been
any playhouses on the Bankside.— Stephen Gosson, in his Plays
confuted in Five several Actions, no date, but written about 1580,
mentions exhibitions at Paul's [St. Paul's school-room], the
Blackfryars, and every other playhouse in London, but says not a
word of Southwark.
VOL. II. M

162

THE LIFE OF

sity of going either on foot or on horseback, coaches
being then certainly not in ordinary use ^. Nor is it
true, that no writer of the time has alluded to this
mode of conveyance to the theatre ; for Sir John Da-
vies, and Dekker, himself a dramatick writer, ex-
pressly allude to it \ Though the fine gentleman

9 According to the writer of an old pamphlet called A Dia-
logue between Coach and Sedan^, the first coach UvSed in Eng-
land was one given by the Earl of Arundel to Queen Elizabeth,
in which she went to St. Paul's cross, to hear a sermon [preached
on account of a victory] obtained over the Spaniards in 1588.
Anderson, in his Hist, of Commerce, p. 4^21, says Fitzallan, Earl of
Arundel, introduced the use of coaches in England in 1580; and
the continuator of Stowe's Annals says a coach was made for
the Queen by a Dutchman in 1564-. However this may have been,
it is certain that coaches were not in ordinary use when Shak-
speare may be supposed to have first visited London.

* *' Faustus, nor lord, nor knight, nor wise, nor old,
To every place about the Towne doth ride ;
" He rides into the Jields, Playes to behold,'' &c.

Epigrams written about the year 1590 ; printed
at Middlebourg, no date, but about 1598.

See also The Guls Horne-booke, by Thomas Dekker, 4to. 1609 :

** By this time [he is describing an ordinary] the pairings of
fruit and cheese are in the voyder, cardes and dice lie stinking in
the fire; the guests are all up, the guilt rapiers ready to be
hanged, the French lacquey and Irish footboy shrugging at the
doores, ixiith their masters hobby horses to ride to the netv play ;
that's the rendevous, thither they are gallopt in post ; let us take
a pair of oares and row lustily after them." Here we see that
even when the Globe theatre on the Bankside, in Southwark, was
in high reputation, gentlemen frequently rode thither, instead of
going by water.

Actors themselves rode to the playhouses in London. See
Taylor's Wit and Mirth, § 30. " Master Field, the player, riding
up Fleet -street a great pace [going probably to the play-house
in Black friars], a gentleman called him and asked him what play
was played that day &c.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 163

whom he describes going from an ordinary to the play-
house on horseback, appears to have been attended by
a lackey, yet many of inferior rank, without doubt,
rode thither, unaccompanied by a servant ; and it is
very natural to suppose, that the horses of such per-
sons should have been held during the representation
by boys, each of whom might obtain a livelihood by
taking charge of several of those animals. I do not,
therefore, I say, object to this anecdote on any of these
grounds ; but for the following reasons :

1. Because Sir William D'Avenant does not ap-
pear at an early period to have obtained any correct
information concerning Shakspeare ; as is evinced by
another fact, which Mr. Rowe has expressly stated as
derived from him ; I mean Lord Southampton's large
donation to our poet, which I shall hereafter prove to
have been extremely exaggerated ; and Mr. Betterton,
though he was born about twenty years after Shak-
speare's death, and had trod the stage before the Re-
storation, instead of making any inquiry about him in
his youth, when that inquiry might perhaps have been
attended with success, was obliged to go to Stratford
in 1708, when he was above seventy years old, and our
poet had been dead near a century, to pick up what
intelligence he could get concerning him : and almost
every part of the intelligence which he did procure,
either there or elsewhere, proves to be erroneous.

2. Because I have myself discovered several circum-
stances relative to our author, and one particularly
concerning his youngest brother, Edmond, imme-
diately connected with his theatrical history, which
neither D'Avenant nor Betterton appear to have

M 2

164

THE LIFE OF

known ; and which D'Avenant, if at an early period
he had made any inquiries from Lowin or Taylor, or
any of the old actors, concerning our poet's connexion
with the stage, undoubtedly would have known. On
this ground, therefore, I have also a right to assume
that no such inquiries were made.

3. But, lastly, and principally, this anecdote is alto-
gether unworthy of belief, because our author's circum-
stances and situation at this time, and the various ex-
tracts which I have just now given from the Records
of Stratford, loudly reclaim against it. The original
framer or relater of it should seem to have supposed
him at this time a mere boy, " hanging loose upon
society," without connexions and without friends ;
whereas, on the contrary, he had already " given
hostages to fortune," having a wife and three children.
His father had been bailiff of Stratford ; and though
about this time he withdrew from the corporation
and was not, as it should seem, in opulent, or even

* ** Stratford Ad aulam ibid. tent. vi. die Septembris anno
Burgus, J regni dnae Elizabethe vicesimo octavo [1586]
William Tyler, Bailif.

" At this hall William Smyth e and Richard Courte are chosen
to be aldermen in the place of John Wheler and John Shaxspere ;
for that Mr. Wheler doth desyer to be put out of the companye,
and Mr. Shaxspere doth not come to the halles, when they be
warned, nor hath not done of long tyme." Registr. Burg,
Stratf, A.

I find, on inspecting the records, that our poet's father had not
attended at any hall for the seven preceding years.

John Shakspeare, the shoemaker, was sworn a constable the
same day that his namesake was removed from his place a«
jilderman.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

165

easy circumstances, there is no reason to suppose that
he did not still carry on his trade. He had himself
visited the metropolis, together with his wife, a few
years before ; and it is not improbable that he had
some connexions there. Whatever might induce his
eldest son to remove from Stratford to London, it
cannot be imagined that his father would there desert
him, or leave him to gain a precarious livelihood by
the menial office of holding horses at the door of a
theatre ; where, I may add, the having a number of
youths under him, publickly distinguished by the
name of Shakspeare's boys, was an expedient not very
likely to contribute to that concealment, which his
situation at that time has been supposed to require.
Our poet's friend, Hamnet Sadler, who appears to
have been godfather to his only son, and who was a
substantial baker at Stratford, would certainly, in such
an extremity, not have left him unassisted. Mr.
Richard Quiney (the son of Adrian Quiney, an
alderman and grocer of Stratford), who was not many
years older than our poet, had doubtless been bred at
the same school, and lived in intimacy with him, would
also, without doubt, have lent him his assistance, and,
had it been necessary, could have recommended him
to Mr. Bartholomew Quiney (probably a relation), a
rich cloth-worker, who was settled in London ^. And
it is not reasonable-to suppose, that his countryman,

3 I found in the Prerogative Office, the will of Mr. Bartho-
lomew Quiney, of Fleet-street, citizen and cloth-worker, made
Feb. 27, 1593-4, and proved the 27th of March following. The
name being very uncommon, I suspect he was a relation of the
Quineys of Stratford.

166

THE LIFE OF

Mr. Richard Field, the son of a tanner in Stratford,
and a very eminent printer in London, whom our poet
in 1593 employed to issue " the first heir of his in-
vention " to the world, would have suffered an amiable
and worthy youth to have remained in so degraded a
state, without making some effort to rescue him from
it. All these circumstances decidedly prove, in my
apprehension, that this anecdote is a mere fiction.
Even supposing that our author was driven from Strat-
ford, which, from the circumstances already stated,
is extremely improbable, may we not be perfectly
assured, that antecedent to that time his inclination
for the theatre had manifested itself (for he was now
twenty-two or twenty-three years old), and that he
had formed some acquaintance with Lord Warwick's,
Lord Leicester's, or the Queen's company of come-
dians. The two former companies were the retainers
of noblemen living within a few miles of Stratford (to
one of whom the manor belonged), and frequently re-
sorted to that town ; and the latter visited it in 1587 ;
perhaps also in the preceding year. And if he had
formed any such acquaintance with those who belonged
to the inside of the theatre, coidd he possibly be under
the necessity of standing in an obscm'e situation at
the outside of it ? It is, I think, much more pro-
bable, that his own lively disposition made him ac-
quainted with some of the principal performers who
visited Stratford, the elder Burbage, or Knell, or
Bentley ; and that there he first determined to engage
in that profession. Lord Leicester's servants, among
whom was one of the performers just mentioned,
James Burbage, the father of the celebrated tragedian.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 167

had been honoured with a royal licence in 1574 ^
With this company, therefore, or the Queen's, or Lord
Warwick's comedians, it is reasonable to suppose, that
he agreed to enroll himself, and that with one or the
other of them he first visited the metropolis.

SECTION X.

The period at which Shakspeare began to write for
the stage, will, I fear, never be precisely ascertained,
unless some manuscript or printed document, relating
to him, which has hitherto eluded all our researches,
shall fortunately be hereafter discovered. The books
of the time, however, afford some glimpses of informa-
tion on this interesting point, and may enable us to
form at least a probable opinion upon it. Every cir-
cumstance, therefore, which may be found in them, in
any way applicable to a question of great importance
in the history of every literary man, should be sifted
and examined with our utmost industry and care ;
every hint, however slight, must be seized and inves-
tigated, and every allusion, however dark or myste-
rious, must, if possible, be unfolded and explained. If,
after all our pains, we shall not be able to gain our
object, we yet may make a near approach to it ; and
shall at least have the satisfaction of reflecting — that
nothing has been omitted to be done, which had the
remotest tendency to attain it.

In forming a conjecture on this subject, some lines
in Spencer's Tears of the Muses demand our parti-
cular attention ; since if they related to Shakspeare,

4 See the Historical Account of the English Stage, vol. iii. p. ^T,

168

THE LIFE OF

as by some has been supposed, they would ascertain
that he had acquired a considerable share of celebrity
as a dramatick writer, some years before the end of
1590, when that piece was first published. That the
reader may be fully master of the question, I shall
here transcribe the whole passage. The subject of
the poem, it should be remembered, is the decay of
literature and patronage, which the Nine Muses in
succession pathetically lament. After Calliope and
Melpomene have uttered their complaints, Thalia, the
Muse of Comedy, is introduced speaking as follows :

" Where be the sweete delights of learning's treasure 5,
** That wont with comich sock to beau ti fie

The painted theatres, and fill with pleasure
** The listeners' eyes and eares with melodie ;
** In which I late was wont to raine as Queene,
** And maske in mirth, with graces well beseene?

*' O, all is gone, and all that goodly glee
" Which wont to be the glorie of gay wits,
*' Is laid abed, and no where now to see ;
** And, in her roome, unseemly Sorrow ^ sits ;

5 The words in this stanza exhibited in Italicks, are not so
printed in the original edition of Spencer's poem. They are here
thus distinguished, because some argument is founded upon them.

6 *' Unseemly Sorrow, ugly Barbarisme." We learn

from Spencer's Ruins of Time, that he was in England in the
latter end of the year 1588. In the summer of the following
year. Sir Walter Ralegh having visited him in Ireland, he
accompanied Ralegh in the autumn to England, and he
appears to have resided there during the remainder of that year
and part of the next, during which time, the first three books of
his Faery Queen were printed. His representation of the de-
graded state of the stage, therefore, may be supposed to relate

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARK

169

*' With hollow brows and greisly countenaunce
•* Marring my joyous gentle dalliaunce :

principally to this period, and was doubtless drawn from his own
observation. During several preceding years, his time was
chiefly passed in Ireland ; yet occasional visits even during that
period gave him an opportunity of partaking of the *' unhurtful
sport " then furnished by theatrical exhibitions. The present
poem, though in its title-page we find 1591, was certainly
written in 1590 or before, and published probably in January
or February, 1590-91 ; for in the Stationers' Register, I find the
following entry : *' William Ponsonby, 29 December ^ 1590. For
his copie under the hands of D'cor Stuller and both the Wardens,
a booke entituled, Complaints, conteyning sundrye small poeraes
of the worlds vanity, via?."

The wretched state of the stage in 1589 and 1590, is ascer-
tained by the history and the productions of that period.

Of the tragedies which were then in vogue, or, as the poet
expresses it, '* tyranized over the minds of men," and which,
though the ** offspring of ugly barbarism and brutish ignorance,"
were preferred to any of the productions of the comick muse, the
greater part have perished. Such of them, however, as have been
preserved, fully justify the description here given of the miserable
taste of that period. See particularly Tamburlain the Great,
The Spanish Tragedy, The Battle of Alcazar, Selimus Emperour
of the Turkes, The Wars of Cyrus, Solyman and Perseda, &c.

The preface to Tamburlaine, 8vo. 1590, as well as the piece
itself, may afford a good comment on the poet's words :

" Gentlemen, and courteous Readers whatsoever. I have herein
published in print for your sakes the tragicall discourse of the
Scythian Shepheard, My hope is, that it will be now no lesse
acceptable unto you, to reade after your serious afl'airs and stu-
dies, than it hath been latelie delightfull for manie of you to see,
when the same was shewed in London upon stages. 1 have pur-
posely omitted and left out some fond and frivolous gestures,
digressing and in my opinion farre unmeet for the matter ; which
I thought might seeme rather tedious unto the wise, then any way
else to be regarded ; though happihje they have bene of some con-

170

THE LIFE OF

** And, him beside, sits ugly Barbarisme,
*' And brutish Ignorance, ycrept of late

Out of dread darknes of the deep abysme,
*' Where being bredd, he light and heaven doth hate :
*' They in the mindes of men now tyrannize,
*' And the faire scene with rudenes foule disguize.

ceiled fondlings greatli/ gaped at, what times they were shewed
upon the stage in XheiY graced deformities

Of the comedies of this period, very fev^^ have come down to us ;
but Wily Beguiled, Mucedorus, and the old Taming of a Shrew,
which were highly admired, may serve to show^, of what materials
those of an inferior quality, which have perished, were made.
'£hQjiggs and other buffooneries, with which both tragedies and
comedies were then frequently accompanied, are almost all lost.

In the plays exhibited at this period, the authors and actors
took such liberties, that the state was obliged to interfere.
Strype, in his Additions to Stowe's Survey, mentions that in
1589, the servants of the Lord Strange and the Lord Admiral
were, on the suggestion of Mr. Tylney [then Master of the
Revels], restrained from playing, for their scurrilitie and licen-
tiousness. In the same year (Nov. 12), the very period when
Spencer appears to have visited England, and to which his verses
seem particularly to relate, the Privy Council wrote a letter to
the Lord Mayor of London (of which a minute may be found in
the History of the English Stage), commanding him *' to ap-
point a sufficient person, learned and of judgment, to join with
the Master of the Revels and a Divine to be named by the
Archbishop of Canterbury, for the reforming of the plays daily
exercised and presented publickly about the city of London ;
where [in] the players take upon them mthotit judgment or
decorum to handle matters of divinity and state." This is the
first notice which is found of a licenser for stage entertainments,
to which appointment the " scoffing scurrility " alluded to by
Spencer, appears to have given rise ; as, in the last century, a
similar degree of licentiousness produced an Act of Parliament
for the same purpose.

In an old tract entitled Martin's Months Mind, which also ap-

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 171

" All places they with foUie have possesst,
*' And with vaine toyes the vulgare entertaine,
*' But me have banished, with all the rest
** That whilome wont to waiteupon my traine;-
** Fine Counterfesaunee 7 and unhurtful Sport,
** Delight and Laughter, deckt in seemly sort.

peared in 1589, we find a further confirmation of what has been
here stated: " Never," says the writer, *^ were greater tragedies
tendered abroad, nor higher comedies traversed at home." — Ros-
cius plays in the Senate house ; asses play upon harpes, the
stage is brought into the church, and Vices make plaies of
church-matters.^^

7 By counterjaisance, Spencer appears to have meant coun-
terfeit or fictitious representation, imitating real life. So, again,
in Mother Hubbard's Tale :

" the fond ape him selfe uprearing hy,

" Upon his tip-toes stalketh statelie by,
" As if he were some great Magnifico,
" And boldly doth among the boldest go :
** And his man Reynard with fine counterfaisance
" Supports his credit and his countenance."
Again, in The Faery Queen, b. i. c. viii. st. 49 :

Such is the face of falshood, such the sight
** Of fowle Duessa, when her borrowed light
*' Is ta'en away, and counterfaisance knowne."
Again, ibid. b. iii. c. viii. st. 8 :

" A wicked spright, —

" Him needed not instruct which way were best
*' Him selfe to fashion likest Florimell,
** Ne how to speake, ne how to use his ffcst,
** For he in counterfesaunee did excell."
See also Cotgrave's French Diet. fol. 1611 :
*^ Farcerie. A playing, jesting, &c, a counterfeiting.
" Farceur. A comedian or stage-player ; a common jeaster,
or counterfeiter of mens gestures."

See also Puttenham's Arte of Poesie, 4to. 1589, p. 228,
*' the boy-bishop with his counterfeit speeches," and p. 243,
'* — a buffoon or counterfeit clotvn,**

172

THE LIFE OF

" All these, and all that els the comick stage

** With season'd wit and goodly pleasaunce graced,

" By which mans life in his likest image

" Was limned forth, are wholly now defaced ;

" And those sweete witts which wont the like to frame,

*' Are now despiz'd, and made a laughing game.

8 One of the comick writers whom Spencer had here in contem-
plation, I have no doubt, was a.person who was bred at the same
college where he had been educated, and who is highly praised
by his contemporary Meres, in the following passage : " The
best for comedye amongst us bee, Edward Earl of Oxford, Dr.
Gager of Oxford, Maister Rowley, once a rare scholar of learned
Pembroke Hall in Cambridge, Maister Edwards of her Majesties
Chapell, eloquent and wittie John Lillye, &c." Wit's Treasury,
1598, p. 280, b. The time when Mr. Rowley flourished, as well
as his Christian name, have been hitherto unascertained ; and in
consequence of a mistake of Antony Wood, he has been con-
founded with William Rowley, who was originally an actor about
the end of Queen Elizabeth's reign, and became a popular dra-
matick writer in that of her successor. Wood in his first work,
published in 1674, grounding himself manifestly on the passage
above quoted from Meres, rightly describes this rare schollar, in
the account which he has given of their poet's contemporaries ;
** Gulielmus Gager (says his Latin translator) poeta eximius erat,
et quoad comedias conscribendas primum semper locum inter
cosevos obtinebat ; posthabitisy nimirum, Edwardo Comiti
Oxoniensi, Magistro Rowley^ (is Aulam Pembrochianam apud
Cantabrigienses ingenio ornavit), Ricardo Edwards, Johanni
Lilly," &c. (Hist, et Antiq. Acad. Oxon. P. II. p. 267) ; but
he was afterwards led into an error, probably by having met in
Phillips or Winstanley with the name of William Rowley as a
dramatick writer ; and in his subsequent English work (Ath.
Oxon. 1690, i. col. 366), he observes, that "Gager was reputed
the best comedian of his time, whether it was Edward Earl of
Oxford, William Rowley, the once ornament for wit and inge-
nuity of learned Pembroke Hall in Cambridge, Richard Edwards
John Lilly," &c. Here first we find the Christian name of this
comick poet : but Wood was unquestionably mistaken ; for " the

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

173

" And HE, the man whom Nature selfe 9 had made
** To mock her selfe, and truth to imitate

rare scholar of learned Pembroke Hall" was not William Rowley
the actor, who had never reposed in academick bowers, but Ralph
Rowley, a learned fellow of that house, whose theatrical exertions^it
may be presumed, were made a few years before Spencer's poem was
published. It is clear from the words— learned Pembroke Hall,"
that Meres was in Wood's contemplation in both his works, and that
in each of them he is speaking of the same person. Beside, however,
the misnomer in the Athense, he is inaccurate in both these works,
in saying that Gager (who appears to have written only Latin
dramas) was preferred to Rowley and the rest. Meres furnishes
no authority for such pre-eminence. They are all classed under
the same general term, — *' the best for comedy." Wood should
seem to have supposed that Gager, being first named, was also
first in reputation ; but Meres appears to have arranged these
poets in chronological order.

Ralph Rowley, I believe, was born in the same year with our
author (1564) ; for I find that he became a student of Pembroke
Hall in 1579, being on the first of October in that year matri-
culated as a member of the University. (Registr. Acad. Cantab.)
In 1582-3, he took his first degree in arts ; in Nov. 1583, he was
elected a fellow of his house ; and in 1586-7, he proceeded
Master of Arts. In 1587, he was appointed Lecturer in Mathe-
matics, and also, in conjunction with Mr. Hall, read the Greek
lecture. See a list of the fellows of Pembroke College, MS.
Harl. 7029, p. 383 : *' Rad Rowley, scholaris collegii, A. B.
electus eodem tempore [Nov. 2, 1583], Anno 1586 [1586-7],
incipit in art. An. 1587, Magistro Halls in usura Magistri
Rowley ex parte prselecturae Grecae, l''**. 10*. Eodem anno prae-
lector fit in academia Mathematicas. Anno 1589, cautio Ma-
gistri Rowley exposita est cistae Lyndwood et Pyke, et habet in
toto 2^"*." It is probable, that either in 1586, before he was
chosen mathematical lecturer, or in 1588, the comick vein for
which he is so highly celebrated by his contemporary Meres (who
was also of Pembroke Hall, and took the degree of Bachelor of
Arts in 1587), led him to attempt dramatick composition, and

174

THE LIFE OF

** With kindly counter under mimick shade, —
" Our pleasaunt Willy, ah, is dead of late ^ ;

that he furnished the stage at St. Paul's with some of those
comedies, ** the fine counterfaisance and due decorum " of which
appeared to Spencer so admirable. Not long afterwards, he en-
tirely relinquished his theatrical pursuits, and went into holy
orders. In 1593, he became rector of Alphamston in Essex,
which he exchanged, in 1597, [for the rectory of Chelmsford, in
the same county. (Newcourt's Repertor, ii. 8. — 129.) This
benefice he appears to have enjoyed till his death, which hap-
pened in 1604< ; and it should seem, from the following entry in
the register of Chelmsford (obligingly communicated to me, by
the Rev. Mr. Morgan), that he died at Cambridge : " Mr.
Ralphe Rowley, late Parson of this towne, was buried in S*.
Marie's chancell in Cambridge, the ixth daie of Aprile, 1604<."
The only production of this " rare scholar " that I have met with,
is a short Latin poem, in the Cambridge Verses on the death of
Sir Philip Sidney, 4to. 1587.

It is, I trust, unnecessary to apologize for this long note, in
commemoration of one who was probably a friend of Spencer's ;
and who, though a comick poet of considerable celebrity, appears
to have been unknown to all our biographical antiquaries and
dramatick historians of the last century.

9 i. e. Nature her self. Such was the phraseology of Spencer's
age ; not, as we should now write. Nature's self. So, in The
Faery Queen, b. iii. c. viii. st. 5 :

" That even Nature self envide the same."

Again, in the same canto :
" thought

*' She were the lady selfe whom he so long had sought."
Again, ibid. b. iii. c. i. st. 6 :

*' But Guyon selfe ere well he was aware — .'*
Again, b. iii. c. iv. st. 38 :

" Sad life worse than glad death ; and greater crosse
♦* To see frends grave, then dead the grave self io engrosse."
Again, in Colin Clout:

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

175

" With whom all joy and jolly merriment
" Is also deaded, and in dolour drent 3.

«' Instead thereof, scoffing Scurrilitie,

*' And scornfuU Follie, with contempt is crept,

Rolling in rymes of shameles ribaudrie %
** Without regard or due decorum kept:

Whose sei-vice high so basely they ensew,
" That Cupid selfe of them ashamed is."
So also, Sidney, Arcadia, 1598, p. 379 :

"The 'pestle selfe,'" &c.
At a subsequent period, this phraseology became obsolete ;
for D'Avenant wrote, perhaps, with less propriety (Works, 1673,
p. 243) :

" It shew'd like Nature's self, when she did bring
All she can promise by an early spring."
^ Kindly means natural, or rather, agreeable to truth and real
life. So, in the Glosse on Spencer's Eclogue for February :
— a manner of supplication, wherein is Undlij coloured
the affection and speech of ambitious men." Counter is, I
believe, here licentiously used for counterfeiting, or counter-
Jaisance. A late writer (Supplem. to Johnson's Diet. 4to.
1801), says, it means — *' trial of skill," and that it is deduced
*' from the adverb;" but, when counter is used in the com-
pound, counter ~2iC\\on^ &c. opposite action is meant ; and, there-
fore, if we suppose a substantive to be thus formed, it would
mean, not " trial of skill," but opposition ; a sense not admissible
here,

^ So, in Colin Clout :

'* Whilst thou wert hence, all dead in dole did lie,"
Again, in Shakspeare's King Henry IV. Part II. :

** Even such a man, so faint and spiritless,

** So dull, so dead in look, so woe-begone —
Again, in A Midsummer Night's Dream :

** So should a murderer look ; so dead, so grim."
' Drenched.

4 Spencer sometimes borrows from himself. See his tenth
Eclogue :

" And roll with rest in rhymes of ribaudry^'

176

THE LIFE OF

*' Each idle Wit at will presumes to make 5,
" And doth the learneds taske upon him take,

** But that same gentle spirit, from whose pen
*' Large streames of honnie and sweete nectar flowe,
** Scorning the boldnes of such base-borne men,
** Which dare their follies forth so rashlie throwe,
'* Doth rather choose to sit in idle cell,
** Than so him selfe to mockerie to sell.

" So am I made the servant of the manie.

And laughing-stock of all that list to scorne ;
** Not honoured nor cared for of anie,
" But loath'dof losels^, and a thing forlorne :
" Therefore I mourne and sorrow with the rest,
" Untill my cause of sorrow be redrest."

The sixth, seventh, and eighth of these stanzas
were inserted by Rowe in the first edition of his short
account of Shakspeare; and he then supposed that they
related to our poet ; alluding, as he thought, to his
having withdrawn himself for some time from the pub-
lick, and discontinued dramatick compositions, from
" a disgust he had taken to the then ill taste of the
town, and the mean condition of the stage." But as
he suppressed the passage in his second edition (pub-
lished in 1714, about five years after the first), it may
be presumed, that he found reason to change his
opinion. Dryden, however, he informs us, always
thought that these verses related to Shakspeare. But

5 *• To rime and versifie ; for in this word, making, our olde
English poets were wont to comprehend all the skill of poetrie,
according to the Greek word poiein, to make ; whence commeth
the name of poets.'' Glosse by E. K. on Spencer*s fourth
Eclogue.

^ Worthless persons.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

177

with all due deference to these great poets, their au-
thority on either side is in this instance of no weight ;
because, in their time, little attention was given to the
gradual progress and changes of our language, and
they appear to have been very slightly acquainted
with the literary history of the former age. It must,
however, be acknowledged that, at the first view, this
passage, in some respects, seems peculiarly applicable
to our great dramatick writer, and admirably descrip-
tive of the character and powers of a poet, of whom it
may be said with the strictest propriety, in the words
of a learned and accomplished statesman ^ of the
seventeenth century, that " Nature never had before
so noble and so true an interpreter, never so inward a
secretary of her cabinet But supposing even that
chronology and the dramatick history of that period
did not stand in our way, as they certainly do, these
lines cannot relate to Shakspeare ; for on a closer in-
spection it will be found, that one part of the descrip-
tion not only does not apply to him, but is totally in-
consistent with the now received, and no longer con-
troverted, account of his moderate literary attain-
ments.

When I published my first edition of his works, the
evidence on each side of this question appeared to me
so equally balanced, that I found myself unable to form
any decided opinion on the subject ; inclining, how-

7 Sir Henry Wotton, speaking of Bacon.

^ It is remarkable that these words are almost a translation of
part of the passage found in Snidas concerning Aristotle, which I
suggested to Mr. Steevens several years ago, as an apposite motto
for the plays of Shakspeare ; and which since has been prefixed
to the several editions of this author that have been published^
VOL. II. N

178

THE LIFE OF

ever, against the application of these verses to Shak-
speare, for the reason just now assigned^: but a more
minute investigation has entirely dispelled my doubts;
and I think I shall be able, not only to show that our
illustrious dramatist was not here pointed at, but to
ascertain the person alluded to ; whose fame, high as
it was in his own time, must acquire additional
celebrity from the eulogy of so great a poet as
Spenser.

On an attentive consideration of these stanzas it
will be found,

1. That they must relate to some contemporary
author, who was peculiarly celebrated for his comick
talents.

9 In a note on The Tears of the Muses, the Rev. Mr. Todd, in
his late edition of Spenser, vol. vii. p. 335, speaking of my first
edition of Shakspeare, says, that I there " strenuously main-
tained the belief" that our poet was the person in Spenser's con-
templation in the lines above quoted. But, I conceive, the
learned editor has inadvertently made this assertion ; and have
no doubt that his candour will induce him to agree to the state-
ment here made in the text, when he peruses the following pas-
sage in the very same page which he has quoted, and which, by
some means, seems to have escaped his attention: ''If these
lines [those quoted from The Tears of the Muses] were intended
to allude to our author, then he must have written some come-
dies in or before the year 1591, and the date which I have as-
signed to A Midsummer Night's Dream is erroneous. I cannot
expect to influence the decision of my reader, on a subject on
Dohich I have not been able to form a decided opinion myself ; and,
therefore, shall content myself with merely stating the difficulties
on each side." Surely those words do not furnish any ground
for thinking that I then strenuously maintained the opinion
ascribed to me.

[Mr. Todd supposes that these lines allude to Sir Philip Sidney.

BoSWELL.]

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 179

2. That the writer alluded to was a distinguished
scholar.

3. That at an antecedent period he had furnished
the scene with several comedies, which had been acted
with great success.

4. That in his dramatick writings he had been
studious to observe a due decorum, and to construct
his pieces according to the legitimate rules of the
drama, observing this decorum, to use the words of an
ancient writer, " in personages, in seasons, in matter,
in speech \" And,

5. That, for some time previous to the composition
of Spenser's poem, he had discontinued writing for the
stage, and retired from London to some sequestered
spot, disgusted by the applause which the low ribaldry
of some of his contemporary poets had met with for a
year or two before these verses were written.

If this be a just comment on them, the consequence
follows, that they could not be intended to describe
the untutored Shakspeare ; who, however we may be
disposed to allow him a certain degree of literature
(and no one is more willing to do so than the present
writer), unquestionably cannot be rated as a learned
man, and who, we have some grounds for believing,
had not produced, I will not say several comedies,
but any drama whatsoever, before the date of the poem
under our consideration : and, if a stage-poet can be
pointed out, the period of whose principal exertions,
and whose character and celebrity as a writer at that

' See the Preliminary Observations prefixed to Spenser's Shep-
heard's Calender, by E. K.

N 2

180

THE LIFE OF

period, correspond with the description here given, all
difficulty, I conceive, will be done away.

It should be recollected that Thalia is the speaker,
and that comedy alone is here in Spenser's contempla-
tion. In the outset she asks,

*' Where be the sweet delights of learning's treasure,
*• That wont with comick sock to beautify
The painted theatres," &c.

She then says, that all the innocent mirth which
formerly was the delight of the ingenious, is now no
where to be found ; and that nothing prevails on the
stage, but either dismal and barbarous tragedies,
which are preferred to all other exhibitions, or vulgar
buffoonery under the name of comedy ; instead of that
natural representation and harmless merriment, which
formerly afforded the frequenters of the theatre so
much entertainment. The lively and pleasant poet
(she adds), who so truly exhibited human life in all
its variety, has of late been idle and unemployed ;
and instead of his classical and Terentian comedies,
with which the publick formerly were gratified, each
miserable scoffer produces on the scene, pieces of low
ribaldry, constructed without any regard to decorum,
and takes upon him that task which the learned writer
alluded to had so happily performed ; while this ad-
mired scholar sits retired in his cell ^, rather than

^ It is observable, that in speaking of that retirement from the
stage, which Spenser so much laments, he says, the writer who
had been once so popular, now sits " in idle cell,'' a word de-
scriptive of the sequestered habitation of an academick. So, in
The Return from Parnassus, a comedy, 1606:

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

181

descend from the dignity of his character, and accom-
modate his productions to the gross and vulgar taste
which then prevailed.

The whole context, therefore, shows, that the person
here commended was a man of learning, and a comick
poet who had observed a strict classical propriety in his
dramas ; a circumstance that, with others furnished
by an attentive survey of the theatrical history of that
period, will enable us to discover his name, and to
dispel the cloud with which he has for more than
two hundred years been enveloped.

Spenser's description, I have no doubt, was intended
for John Lilly, " the eloquent and xvittie John
Lilly," as he is denominated by one of his contempo-
raries ^ ; a poet, whose learning sufficiently entitled
him to a part of this encomium : and if in other re-

" Academico. I'll haste me to my Cambridge cell again,
*' My fortunes cannot wax, but they may waine.'*
*• When I left the freedom of my cell^ which was my college
(said Hooker to the Archbishop of York, when he wished to be
removed from the Mastership of the Temple), yet I found some
degree of it in my quiet country parsonage." Walton's Life of
Hooker.

It is not very clear what is meant by the title of one of
Greene's pamphlets, published in 1589 ; yet it perhaps alludes
to Lilly's retirement from the stage, which I have supposed to
have taken place in that year. The title to which I allude is,
*' Menaphon, Camillaes alarum to slumbering Euphues in his
melancholy cell in Silexedra," &c. Silexedra, it is true, is men-
tioned by Lilly at the end of his work ; yet Greene might have
had here a double meaning.

3 Palladis Tamia, Wit's Treasury, being the second part of
Wits Commonwealth, by Francis Meres, M. A. 8vo. 1598,
p. 283, b.

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spects it should be thought to exceed his real merits,
let it be remembered, that in this point we are not to
be governed by our own judgments, but to transport
ourselves two centuries backwards, and not only to
judge with the eyes, and ears, and opinions, of his con-
temporaries, all of whom speak of his comick talents
with the highest praise, but also to make some allow-
ance for the particular taste and partiality of Spenser.
How apt he was to exceed in the eulogy of his friends,
— whether from good nature, or a disposition easy to
be pleased, — is evinced by his high commendation of
another poet of that age, which I shall presently have
occasion to quote, and which certainly greatly exceeds
what we should now be willing to allow him We
should also bear in mind, that there are the strongest
grounds for believing that Shakspeare had not yet
afforded Spenser any specimen of higher excellence ;
that at all periods, he who far surpasses his contempo-
raries, must be allowed a considerable degree of merit ;
and that in comedy, which alone was here in the
writer's contemplation, the reputation of the poet
supposed to be alluded to, was at this time unrivalled.

4 See the verses on Daniel, infra, quoted from Spenser's
Colin Clout's Come Home Again. Drayton's eulogy on Mar-
lowe, though a poet of considerable merit, is not less extravagant.
In his *' Epistle concerning Poetry and Poets/' he seems to place
him in a higher rank than Shakspeare :

** Next Marlowe, bathed in the Thespian springs,

Had in him those brave transl unary things,
" That the first poets had ; his raptures were
" All air and fire, which made his verses clear ;
" For that fine madness still he did retain,
** Which rightly should possess a poet's brain."

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 183

When the genius of Shakspeare afterwards blazed out,
we shall hereafter find that Spenser was not insensible
to his merits.

Edward Blount, who was at once a bookseller and
a writer, and who had undoubtedly often seen the
effect produced by his comedies ^, describes as the
rarest poet of that time (that is, his own time, — the
period previous to the appearance of Shakspeare), the
witty, comical, facetiously quick, and unparalleled
John Lilly ^" His contemporaries Webbe \ Nashe ^

5 Edward Blount, who was one of the original publishers of
Shakspeare's plays, in folio, was probably born in having
been bound an apprentice to William Ponsonby, for ten years,
from Midsummer, 1578. He was admitted to the freedom of the
Stationers' Company in June, 1588.

^ In 1632, Edward Blount published six of his comedies under
the following title : *' Sixe Court Comedies, often presented and
acted before Queen Elizabeth by the Children of her Majesties
Chappell and the Children of Paules. Written by the only rare
poet of that time, the wittie, comicall, facetiously quicke and
unparalleled, John Lilly, Master of Artes. Decies repetita place-
bunt.''

In his Dedication to Richard Lord Viscount Lumley, he ob-
serves, *• It can be no dishonour to listen to this poet's musike,
whose tunes alighted in the eares of a great and ever famous
Queene: his invention was so curiously strung, that Elizaes
Court held his notes in admiration," Lilly, he adds, " sat at the
Sunne's table : Apollo gave him a wreathe of his own bayes with-
out snatching : the lyre he played on had no borrowed strings.' '
In his Preface, he says, Reader I have for the love I beare to
posteritie, dig'd up the grave of a rare and excellent poet, whom
Queene Elizabeth then heard, graced and rexvarded. These
papers of his lay like dead lawrels in a churchyard ; but I have
gathered the scattered branches up, and by charme, gotten from
Apollo, made them greene againe, and set them up as epitaphes
to his memory, ... A sinne it were to suffer these rare monuments

184

THE LIFE OF

and Meres ^ give him no less praise ; and Lodge ^
highly commends his " extraordinary facility of dis-

of wit to be covered in dust. . . . Oblivion shall not so trample on a
Sonne of the Muses, and such a sonne as they called their
darling. . . . These his •playes crowned him with applause and the
spectators with pleasure. Thou cannot repent the reading of them
over. When old John. Lilly is merry with thee in thy chamber,
thou shalt see few or none of our poets now [1632] are such
wittie companions, and thank me that brought him to thy ac-
quaintance."

The six plays here collected, are, Endymion, Alexander and
Campaspe, Sappho and Phao, Galathea, Mydas, and Mother
Bombie. They had originally been printed in quarto ; but being,
as he said, scattered and unconnected, he had the merit of
making them more accessible, by printing them together in a
small volume ; and he added, from manuscript, the numerous
songs which had been omitted in the original editions. The plays
of Lilly, which were not collected in this volume, are, The
Woman in the Moon, printed in quarto, in 1597, and a pastoral,
entitled Loves Metamorphosis, quarto, 1600. Kirkman, a book-
seller, after the Restoration, ascribed also to this author The
Maids Metamorphosis ; but it was printed anonymously in
1600 ; and on that, and other grounds, it may be doubted
whether it was Lilly's composition.

Wood erroneously calls the collector of Lilly's plays Sir
Henry Blount.

7 Discourse of English Poetry, quarto, 1586.

^ See Nashe's Apologie of Pierce Pennilesse, quarto, 1593,
signat. 0 4. (He is speaking of Lilly, and the person whom he
addresses is Gabriel Harvey.) "He that threatned to conjure
up Martin's wit, hath written something in thy praise in Pap-
hatchet [a pamphlet written by Lilly in 1589] for all you accuse
him to have covertlie incenst the Earle of Oxford against you.
Mark him well ; he is but a little fellow, but hee hath one of the
best wits in England. Should he take thee in hand againe (as he
fiieth from such inferior concertation), I prophecie there would be
more gentle readers die of a merrie mortalitye ingendred by the
eternal jests he would maule thee with, than there have done this

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

185

course," by which he may have meant dialogue. But
the strongest proof, perhaps, that can be adduced to
show how highly his comick talents were rated, is found
in the encomiastick verses on Shakspeare, written by
Jonson ; who, knowing the opinions of the former age,
and the high estimation in which the productions that
we are now considering had been held, thought he
could not, in a few words, more forcibly describe our
great dramatick poet's comick excellence, than by say-
ing he outshone even Lilly in comedy, as he sur-
passed the admired and lofty stories of Marlowe in
the tragick drama :

*' That I not mix thee so, my brain excuses ;

** I mean, with great, but disproportion d * Muses ;

last infection. I my self that enjoy but a mite of xuit in compari-
son of his talent, in pure affection to my native country make my
style carry a presse sail, — am faine to cut off half the streame of
thy sport-breeding confusion, for feare it should cause a general
hicket throughout England." See also his Have With You to
Saffron Walden, quarto, 1596, signat. X 2. b.
9 Ubi supra.

» Divine wits, for many things as sufficient as all antiquity,
(I speake it not on light surmise, but considerate judgment,) to
you belongs the death that doth nourish this poison ; to you the
paine that endure the reproofe. Lilly, the famous for facility in
discourse ; Spencer, best read in ancient poetry ; Daniel, choice
in word and invention ; Drayton, diligent and formal ; Th.
Nashe, true English Arctine ; — all you unnamed professors or
friends of poetry, but by me inwardly honoured ; knit your indus-
tries in private, to unite our fames in publike,. . .. and all so em-
battle your selves, that hate of virtue may not embase you."
Wits Miserie and the Worlds Madnesse, by Thomas Lodge, 4to.
1596.

* Chaucer, Spenser, and Beaumont. He considered the last

186

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For, if I thought my judgement were of years,
I should commit thee surely with thy peers 3,
*' And tell, how far thou dost our Lilly outshine,
" Or sporting Kyd ^ or Marlowe's 5 mighty line."

Supposing, however, that Spenser's eulogy went
beyond the opinions of that age, which does not appear
to have been the case, some allowance, as has been
already hinted, may be claimed for the kindness of
friendship, and for the feelings of this exquisitely
tender and moral poet, whose taste would naturally
prefer scenick productions, founded, as Lilly's gene-
rally were, on classick fables, and conducted in some
instances with a pastoral simplicity, to any other.
Whenever Spenser visited the playhouse, we may be
confident that he directed his steps to the theatre
where Lilly's comedies were performed by the singing-
boys of St. Paul's, or the children of the Revels,
rather than to the city theatres (the Red Bull, &c.),
where the compositions of Greene, Peele, and Mar-
lowe, were represented^.

named writer, though a dramatist, as disproportionedy probably
on account of his superior learning,
3 Thedramatick poets.

* This epithet appears to have been chosen merely in allusion
to Kyd's name ; yet not a single comedy of his has come down
to us. He was the author of The Spanish Tragedy (to which
Jonson himself made additions) ; the tragedy of Cornelia, both
printed ; and probably several others, that have been lost.

5 Of Marlowe, some account will be given hereafter.

^ How congenial the sentiments of Spenser and Lilly were,
with respect to the decorum of the stage, and the true ends
and objects of comedy, appears from the following passage in
Lilly's prologue, at Blackfriars, to Sappho and Phaon, 1584 ;
whichj when compared with the verses already quoted from the

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 187

John Lilly was bom in Kent, about the same year
with Spenser ^ (1553) ; and it is not improbable that
when Spenser quitted his residence in the North, and
came into Kent ^, about the year 1577 or 1578, he
might have formed a friendship with this poet, then,
I believe, newly returned from abroad, and perhaps a
visitor in his native county. Lilly, in 1569, at six-
teen years of age, became a member of Magdalen
College in Oxford; in 1573 he took the degree of
Bachelor, and that of Master of Arts in 1575-6^. He
seems afterwards to have travelled ; and in 1579, if
not before, after his return from foreign parts, his cele-

Tears of the Muses, afford considerable support to my interpreta-
tion of that passage. See particularly the fourth, fifth, sixth, and
seventh stanzas :

*' Our intent was at this time, to more intvarde delight, not
outwardelighnes, and to breede, if it might be, soft smiling, not
lowd laughing : knowing it to the wise to be as great pleasure to
heare counsell mixed with witte, as to the foolish to have sport
mingled with rudenesse. They were banished the theater at
Athens and from Rome hissed, that brought parasites on the
stage with apish actions, or fooles with uncivill habites, or
curtizans with immodest words. We have endevored to be as far
from unseemly speeches, to make your eares glow, as we hope
you will be free from unkinde reportes, to make our cheekes
blush."

7 In his Euphues and his England (signat, Hh 2 b.), he says,
he can speak little of Queen Mary's reign, being then scarce
born. Mary ascended the throne, June 1, 1553. I find, from
the register of the University (in which he is described as ple-
beii Jllius ")y that he was matriculated in 1571. He is there
said to be seventeen ; which does not exactly agree with Wood's
account.

8 See the Commentary on Spenser's Fifth Eclogue, 4to. 1579.

9 Ath. Oxon. i.295.

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brated work, entitled Euphues, The Anatomy of Wit \
was published ; and in the following year appeared
Euphues and his England, a composition not less ad-
mired than his former production, of which it may be
considered the sequel or second part. In both these
works, though written in a quaint, aflPected, and re-
prehensible style, which yet at that time, and for
many years afterwards, was extravagantly admired,
are found a vein of good sense, and many just obser-
vations on mankind. Probably in consequence of the
high reputation acquired by the first of these produc-
tions, he was, in 1579? incorporated a Master of Arts
in Cambridge. It is a creditable circumstance to Lilly,
that he was patronized by Edward Vere, the seven-
teenth Earl of Oxford, whom he calls his master ; who
appears to have been the most distinguished nobleman
of his time for learning and poetical talents, and was
himself an admired comick writer. Between the years
1580 and 1586, or 1587, Lilly, it may be conjectured,
produced five comedies ; Alexander and Campaspe,

^ In Mr. Capell's collection, in Trinity College, Cambridge, is
an edition of Lilly's Euphues, without date ; which I believe to
be the first. It consists of eighty-one leaves, and has not the
apologetical address to the University of Oxford, which appears
to have been written in consequence of some offence taken, by
the Oxonians, at his book. My edition, which is dated 1579,
and is said, in the title-page, to be " corrected and augmented,"
has that address ; and I, therefore, suppose it to be the second.
The work, having been entered in the Stationers* register, in
1578, I imagine, was published either in the end of that
year, or early in 1579. Lilly himself tells us it was first
published in winter. The second edition appeared in the summer
or autumn of the same year (1579).

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 189

Galathea, Sappho and Phao, Midas, and Endymion ;
all of which were represented by the choir-boys of St.
Paul's, in their singing school-room, and often acted
by them at court before Queen Elizabeth, with great
applause. He had, as he himself tells us, been
" entertained her Majesty's servant by her gracious
favour," and had been taught to hope, that he might
have been rewarded with the reversion of the office of
Master of the Revels, or with that of Master of the
Tents and Toils ; but after thirteen years' service and
expectation, he found, when he had cast up the in-
ventory of his friends, hopes, promises, and times, that
the sum total amounted to just nothing." His com-
plaints on this subject were poured forth in two peti-
tions to the Queen ^, the latter of which, I conjecture,
from a circumstance mentioned in it, was presented in
1588; and it maybe presumed, that not long after-
wards, finding his hopes of preferment disappointed,
and the publick taste so vitiated that nothing but
folly and *vain toyes could succeed on the stage, he
retired for some time either to Oxford or to a cottage
in his native county ^. Soon afterwards, the theatre,

* Catal. Lib. Manuscript. Anglise, &c. Col, Univers. 152, 13.
MS. Harl. 1877.

3 About two years after Lilly appears to have made a tempo-
rary retreat from the stage, the choir-boys of St. Paul's were pro-
hibited from playing: and in 1591, or before, their playhouse
was shut up, probably on account of the scurrility and licentious-
ness which had prevailed for two or three preceding years in many
of the theatres ; and tliis prohibition, I believe, continued for about
ten years, In the preface to Lilly's Endymion, published in 1591,
the printer says, " Since the playes in Paules were dissolved^

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THE LIFE OF

in which his comedies had heen represented^ was shut
up by authority, on account of that licentiousness and
ribaldry to which Spenser alludes.

The character of Lilly, as a dramatick writer, has
been unjustly depreciated in modern times, in conse-
quence, I conceive, of its being supposed that his
scenick productions are written in the same faulty

there are certain comedies come to my handes, which were pre-
sented before her Majestic at severall tymes by the Children of
Panics. This is the first," 8cc. See also Nashe's Have With
You to Saffron Walden, 4.to. 1596 (signat. G 4-. b.), " Troth, I
would hee might for mee, (that's all the harme I wish him,) for
then we neede never wish the playes at Panics up againe ; but if
we were wearic with walking, and loth to goe too farre to seeke
sport, into the Arches we might step, and heare him [Gabriel
HarveyJ plead, which would be a merrier comedie than ever was
old Mother Bombie " [one of Lilly's plays].

In 1600, or 1601, this interdiction was taken off, and the
children of St. Paul's were again permitted to play. Martin's
Antonio and Mellida, Jack Drum's Entertainment, and Dekker's
Satiromastix, were performed by them in 1601.

Lilly, after having retired for some years, appears to have
again resumed the pen ; for his Woman in the Moon was entered
in the Stationers' register, September 22, 1595, and published in
1597 ; but the theatre where his former pieces were represented
being then shut, it appears to have been acted only at Court,
probably by the children of his Majesty's chapel, or the children
of the Revels. It may, however, have been presented at a
former period.

That Lilly was living in 1597, is ascertained by his verses
prefixed to a book entitled Cliristian Passions, by H. Lok, pub-
lished in that year. The exact time of his death is not known,
but it probably happened soon after the year 1600. No particu-
lars of his person, or private life, have come down to us, except
that he was married ; that he was a little man, and a great taker
of tobacco.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 191

style with his other works ; and that they all abound
with perpetual allusions to a kind of fabulous natural
history, in which he and some of his contemporaries
frequently indulged themselves, and for which he has
been justly censured by Drayton and others. But
this is not the fact ; for though in three of his come-
dies he has too often fallen into this kind of impro-
priety, the general tenour of the other three is dif-
ferent ; and, notwithstanding his defects, many of
which in his own time were thought beauties, he un-
questionably makes a nearer approach to a just de-
lineation of character and life, than any comick poet
that preceded Shakspeare. That they are free from
quaintness, a too frequent play upon words (which at
that time, however, was esteemed genuine wit), and
some other faults, cannot be asserted with truth ; but
these defects are, in some degree, balanced by a live-
lier dialogue, and a more natural representation than
his contemporaries produced. In the greater part of
his plays, the division into acts and scenes is critically
attended to, and the unities of action, time, and place,
are well observed. It may also be remarked, that
Lilly has not produced a single tragedy, and that all
his comedies are replete with " learning's treasure ;"
for they not only are founded on classick fables, as
the plays performed by the choir-boys of St. Paul's
generally were*, but abound with allusions to mytho-

See the passage quoted in note 6, next page, where they are
spoken of as " musty fopperies of antiquity.'' In the History of
the English Stage, it will be seen that the following plays,
founded on classical subjects, were performed by the children of
St. Paul's, between the years 1571 and 1589 ;

192 THE LIFE OF

logy, and quotations from the Roman poets. If it
should be objected, that in this respect he has little
preserved that due decorum so much admired by
Spenser, his courtiers, peasants, servants, husband-
men, nymphs, and chambermaids, all occasionally
speaking Latin, and all equally well, it should be re-
collected that this practice v^as not peculiar to him^.
A fact also should be remembered, w^hich, I think, has
escaped the notice of all our dramatick historians,
though some of the passages by which it is ascertained
have been quoted for other purposes. The circum-
stance to which I allude is, that the audience usually
assembled in the room behind the Convocation- House
of St. Paul's, where all his plays were represented,
was of a higher order, and composed of very different
persons from those who frequented common theatres ;
for it should seem to have principally consisted of
gentlemen and scholars % without any intermixture

1571, Iphigenia.
ISTS-^, Alcmeon.

Timoclea at the Siege of Thebes.

Perseus and Andromeda.
1576, History of Errour (doubtless from Plautus).
Before 1579, Cupid and Psyche.

1579, Scipio Africanus.

1580, Pompey.

1584, Alexander and Campaspe.
Sappho and Phaon.
Galathea.

Between 1585 and 1589, Endymion, Midas.

5 Latin quotations are frequently found in the plays produced
at the period here spoken of, particularly in those which were
represented by the choristers of St. Paul's.

6 This appears from the following passages in an old play,

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

193

of females ; and appears to have borne some resem-
blance to the audiences now annually collected to

entitled " Jack Drum's Entertainment, or the Comedy of
Pasquil and Katherine, 4<to. 1601, which was acted by the Chil-
dren of St. Paul's. In the Introduction, in answer to the Tyreman,
who complains that the Author had snatched the play-book
from him, and with violence kept the boys from entering on the
stage, one of the children says, —

** You much mistake the action, Tyerman ;
" His violence proceeds not from a mind
*' That grudgeth pleasure to this generous presence,
*' But doth protest all due respect and love
** Unto this choice selected audience^
Again, in the fifth Act :

** Sir Edtv. Now by my troth, and [if] I had thought
on't, too

** I would have had a play ; i' faith, I would.
*' I saw the Children of Pauls last night,
*' And troth they pleas'd me pretty pretty well ;
" The apes in time will do it handsomely.

" Pla. V faith,
*' I like the audience that Jrequenteth there
*' With much applause. A man shall not be choked
" With the stench of garlicky nor be pasted to
** The barmy jacket of a beer-bretver.

" Brah. Jun. Tis a good gentle Audience ; and 1 hope the
boys

** Will come one day into the Court of Requests."
[This, I believe, is nothing more than a poor pun : * I hope
they will one day be in request."']

" Brah. Sen. Ay, and [if] they had good plays ; but

they produce
Such musty fopperies ff antiquity,
'* And do not suit the humorous age's back
*' With cloaths in fashion."
See also the Prologue to Antonio and Mellda, 1601, acted by
the children of St. Paul's :

VOL. II, O

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hear one of Terence's comedies acted by the young
gentlemen of Westminster school. Such dramas,

" The wreath of pleasure and delicious sweets
" Begirt the gentle front of this fair troop.
" Silent and most respected auditors,
'* For wit's sake do not dream of miracles.

Alas, we shall but falter, if you lay
'* The least sad weight of an unused hope
" Upon our weakness ; only we give up
'* The worthless present of slight idleness
" To your authentick censure. . . .
** But oh, the healthy dryness of her braine
" Foil to your fertile spirits, is ashamed
" To breathe her blushing numbers to such ears :
" Yet, most ingenious, deign to veil our wants."
So also, Lilly himself, in the Prologue to his Campaspe ;
" We here conclude ; wishing that although there be in your
precise judgments an universal mislike, yet vre may enjoy hy your
•wonted courtesies, a general silence."

Again, in the Prologue to Sapho and Phaon, 1594, when it was
acted at Blackfriars : " — yet we have ventured to present our
exercise before your judgments, when we know them [their exer-
cise] full of weak matter, yielding rather to the curtesie which
we have ever found than to the precisenes which we ought to
feare."

Again, in the Prologue to his My das :

*' We are jealous of your judgments, because you are wise ;
of our own performance, because we are unperfect; of our
author's device, because he is idle. Only this doth encourage
us ; — that presenting our studies before gentlemen, though they
receive an inward mislike, we shall not be hissd with an open
disgrace.

Stirps rudis urtica est ; stirps generosa rosa."
See also the concluding speech of Marston's Antonio's
Revenge, performed at St. Paul's, in 1601 or 1602 :
*' And O if ever time create a Muse
*' That to the immortal fame of virgin faith
*' Dares once engage his pen to write her death.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

195

perhaps it may be urged, were little suited to a
courtly audience, composed of both sexes, before
which they sometimes were exhibited; but let it be
remembered that they were not originally intended
for such an audience ; and even at court, we know
that many of the female nobility, and attendants on
the Queen, were, like her Majesty, acquainted with
the Latin language; consequently neither his allusions
nor his quotations, could even there fail of being
understood by a large portion of his auditors ; and

" Presenting it in some black tragedy,
*****

** May it have gentle presence, and the scenes suckd up
" By calm altention of choice audience.''

That the audience at this theatre consisted only of men, ap-
pears from Marston's Epilogue to Antonio and Mellida ; in which,
as well as in some of Lilly's plays, the address is only to the male
sex ; " Gentlemen. Though I remain an armed Epilogue," &c.

See also Lilly's Prologue to Midas : " Gentlemen ; so nice is
the world," &c. ; and the quotation above, from a subsequent
part of the sam.e prologue. So, in the Induction of Jack Drum's
Entertainment, played at St. Paul's : " In good faith, gentlemen^
I think we shall be forced to give you right Jack Drums Enter-
tainment," &c. The Epilogue to Lilly's Galathea, where we find
*' You ladies may see," &c. was a court epilogue.

In the theatres, where women were admitted as well as men,
those supplicatory addresses are to both sexes. See the Epilogue
to As You Like It, and many other plays.

The price of admission into the theatre of St. Paul's, appears
to have been double to what was demanded at the playhouse at
Newington Butts, which was then specifically called The Thea-
tre, and probably to the price of admission at the Curtain/ at that
period ; a circumstance which contributed to render the audience
more select. See Lilly's Pap with a Hatchet, &c. [1589],
Signat. D 3. in marg. : " If it be shewed at Paules, it will cost
you fourepence, at the Theater twopence."

O 2

196

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their introduction, instead of being thought a fault,
was undoubtedly considered a beauty. In further
support of Spenser's eulogy on this poet, I may add,
that several of his characters are happily conceived,
and some of them may have been models to subse-
quent dramatists. In our author's early plays, we
may sometimes trace, in the lower characters, an imi-
tation of Lilly's manner \ His Alchemist and As-
tronomer in Galathea, perhaps, gave rise to Jonson's
Subtle, and Congreve's Foresight ; and Sir Tophas in
Endymion may in like manner have been the remote
original of Malvolio in Twelfth Night, where nearly
the same name is applied to another character. In
his Galathea, to the change of sex in which piece I
suspect Spenser particularly alludes, when he speaks
of his admired poet's " fine count erf esance^ and un-
hurtful sport," the opening may, longo intervallo, re-
mind us of the first scene in The Tempest, as that of
Richard the Third is evidently formed on a passage
in Lilly's Campaspe ^ : and of the numerous songs in

7 See particularly The Comedy of Errors, and The Two Gen-
tlemen of Verona.

8 *' Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths ;
*' Our stern alarums chang'd to merry meetings ;
*' Our dreadful marches to delightful measures ;
" Grim-visaged war hath smooth'd his wrinkled front,
** And now, instead of mounting barbed steeds,
" To fright the souls of fearful adversaries,
*' He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber,
" To the lascivious pleasing of a lute."

K. Richard III. Act I. Sc. I.
" Is the warlike sound of drum and trump turn'd to the soft
noise of lyre and lute ? The neighing of harb'd steeds, whose

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 197

his plays, many of which are uncommonly elegant
and happy, and seem to have been particularly
alluded to by Spenser^, some passages have been
expressly imitated by Shakspeare.

But how, it will be asked, can John Lilly be
alluded to, under the words — " our pleasant Willy
This seeming difficulty may be easily removed, by
attending to the phraseology of Spenser's age, and
adverting to a conceit, which seems frequently to
have governed him in the formation of poetical names,
shadowing real persons.

In his time shepherd was a common denomination
of a poet. Thus Shakspeare, in As You Like It,
apostrophizing Marlowe, who was not a pastoral, but
a dramatick poet, —

" Dead shepherd, now I see thy saw of might ;
Whoever lov'd, that lov'd not at first sight? "

In like manner Spenser, throughout his poem, en-
titled Colin Clout's Come Home Again, as well as in
various other parts of his works, uses these terms as
synonymous.

loudness fiU'd the air with terrour, and whose breaths dimmed
the sun with smoak, converted to delicate tunes and amorous
glances,'' &c. Campaspe, 1584<.

Here we find the germ of the preceding passage, in which
Shakspeare, with his usual felicity, has expanded Lilly's thought.
This parallelism was first pointed out by Mr. Reid.
9 " That want with comick sock to beautify
*' The painted theatres, and fill with pleasure
*' The listeners' eyes and eares with melody."
In the last line, I conceive Spenser particularly alluded to
Lilly's songs, which are eminently smooth and elegant in their
composition, and doubtless had the aid of such musick as then
was most in vogue.

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As shepher^d was a common appellation for any of
the poetical tribe ^, so fVilly was a common name for a
shepherd ; and hence, probably, this denomination w^as
sometimes applied by the writers of Shakspeare's age,
to poets who had no claim to the Christian name of
William. Thus, in an ancient song, probably of the
time of James the First,

" As Willy once essay 'd

*' To look for a lamb that was stray'd," &c.

and in an Eclogue on the death of Sir Philip
Sidney (as Dr. Farmer formerly suggested to me),
which was written not long after that event, perhaps
by Arthur Warren \ a poet very little known, we find

9 So, in Florio's Second Frutes, Ito. 1591 : " But not I, nor
this place, may halfe suffice for his [Lord Leicester's] praise,
which the sweetest singer of all our western shepheards hath so
exquisitely depicted, that, as Achilles by Alexander was ac-
counted happy for having such a rare emblazoner of his magna-
nimitie as the Alconian poete, so I account him thrice fortunate
in having such a herauld of his virtues as Spencer."

^ The Eclogue here quoted first appeared in Davison's Poetical
Rhapsodies, 8vo. 1602 ; where it is entitled " An Eclogue made
long since on the Death of Sir Philip Sidney ; " and it is sub-
scribed with the letters, A. W. In the Museum, among Sir
Symonds D'Ewes's manuscripts, is one (MS. Harl. 280, fol. 99)
containing, " a catalogue of all the poems in ryme and measured
verse, by A. W.," and the first line of eacli poem is given. At
the end is a notice, that " in a parchment book bound with The
Shepheard's Calendar is an Eclog on the Death of Sir Philip
Sidney, by A. W. beginning ' Perin, aread,' &cc." which is the
eclogue in question ; and it is highly probable that it was written
immediately after Sidney's death. The initial letters, A. W.
I suspect to have denoted Arthur M^arren, of whose avowed pro-
ductions, the only poem that I have seen is entitled " The Poor
Mans Passions, and Poverties Patience," 4<to. 1605, which is in
my collection.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

199

the celebrated author of the Arcadia, lamented in se-
veral stanzas by the name of Willy ^. On this
ground alone, therefore, " our pleasant Willy ah ! is
dead of late," might mean, — our spritely poet is of
late as silent as the grave, and wholly unemployed.

2. But Spenser, I have no doubt, had a further
object in view, and intended enigmatically to point
out the person in his contemplation ; though he
might have thought it more suitable to the general
tenour of his poem not expressly to name him ^ ; and

* " Willy is dead,
** That wont to lead

" Our flocks and us in mirth and shepherds' glee.
-X- * * -x-

" Of none but Willy's pipe they made account
* -x- * X- *

" We dream'd our Willy aye should live,
*• So sweet a sound his pipe did give."
3 In like manner, Spenser, wishing to show his respect and
gratitude to his patron, Arthur Lord Grey, on his government of
Ireland, instead of mentioning, in express terms, the country to
which he was sent, tells us, that Artegall, i. e. the equal or
just Arthur (a fictitious name, formed from the first syllable of
Lord Grey's Christian name, and the French word egal), went
to succour the lady Irena, the metathesis of lerna or lerne, the
ancient name of that kingdom :

" And such was he of whom I have to tell
" The champion of tvuejustice, Artegally
" Whom (as ye lately mote remember well,)
** An hard adventure which did then befall
** Into redoubled peril forth did call :

That was, to succour a distressed dame
** Whom a strong tyrant did unjustly thrall,
" And from the heritage which she did claime
" Did with strong hand withhold ; Grantorto was his name.

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therefore wrote IVilly iox ' Lilly, changing only the
first letter * ; as, in another poem \ he has introduced

" Wherefore that lady which Irena hight,

'* Did to the Faerie Queene her way addresse

*' To whom complayning her afflicted plight

" She her besought of gratious redresse :

" That soveraigne queene^ that mightie emperesse,

Whose glorie is, to aide all suppliants pore,
" And of weake princes to be patronesse,
** Chose Artegall to right her to restore,
" For that to her he seem'd best skil'd in righteous lore."

Faery Queen, b. v. c. i. st. 3, 4.
4 *' Out of names (says Camden), the busie head of man, con-
tinually working, hath wrought, out of liking or dislike, allusions,
very common in all ages and among all men. ... An allusion is, as
it were, a dalliance or playing with words, like in sound, but un-
like in sense, by changing, adding, or substracting a letter or
two ; so that words nicking and resembling one the other, are
appliable to different significations. . . . The Greekes (to omit infi-
nite others,) nicked Antiochus Epiphanes, with EpinajieSy that
is, the furious. The Romans likewise played with bibbing Tibe-
rius NerOy calling him Biberius Mero. So, Tully called the ex-
torting Verres, in the actions against him, VerrenSy as sweep-all.
So, in Quintilian, the sower fellow Placidus was called Acidus ;
and of late, one called Scaliger, Aliger." Remaines, 4t.o. 1605.
To these observations of Camden, I may add, that in the maxim
of the moralists, which allows us, in conversation, to be facetosiy
but not acetosi, a similar conceit may be discerned. Spenser,
therefore, to whom all ancient learning was familiar, had, we see,
classical authority for this practice. About forty years before. Dr.
Collet, the learned and pious Dean of St. Paul's, in the code of
laws which he wrote for the government of his school, did not
think it unbecoming his gravity to indulge in a similar playfulness
of language. *' And then (says he, let them read) Institutum
Christiani Hominis, which that learned Erasmus made at my re-
quests, and the boke called Copia, of the same Erasmus; and
then other authors Christian ; as Lactantius, Prudentius, and

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

201

Robert, or, in the familiar language and orthography
of that age, Robbin Earl of Leicester, under the ap-

Probus and Sedulius, and Juvencus and Baptista Mantuanus,
and suche other as shall be thought convenient, and most to
purpose unto the true Laten speeche ; all barbary, all corruption,
all Laten adulterate, which ignorant blind foles brought into this
worlde, and with the same hath distayned and poysonid the old
Laten speche, and the verage Romayne tongue, whiche in the
tyme of Tully and Sallust and Virgill and Terence was usid,
whiche also Sainte Jerome and Sainte Ambrose, and Sainte
Austen, and many holy doctors lernid in their tymes : I saye,
that filthynes, and all suche abusion, whiche the later blinde
worlde brought in, whiche more rather may be called blotterature,
than litterature, I utterlye abannyshe and exclude out of this
Scole." Knight's Life of Dean Collet, p. 364.
5 Colin Clout's Come Home Again :

'* Ah Colin, then said Hobbitwl, the blame
*' Which thou imputest, is too general ;
*' As if not any gentle wit of name
*' Nor honest mind, might there * be found at all.
*' For well, I wot, sith I mi/ selfe noas there,
" To wait on Lobbin, (Lobbin well thou knowest,)
" Full many worthie ones then waiting were
" As ever else in prince's court thou viewest."
Colin, it should be remembered, is Spenser, and Hobbinol, his
friend Gabriel Harvey, who is here speaking of patronage and
the Court. Harvey, in his Pierce's Supererogation enumerates
Lord Leicester among his friends and patrons, *' to whose
worshipful and honourable favours (says he) I have been be-
holding for letters of extraordinary commendation, such, as some
men of good experience have doubted whether they ever vouch-
safed the like to any of either University." See also Three
Proper and Wittie Familiar Letters, &c. 4*10. 1580, p. 27.

Robin (usually mis-spelt Robbin) was the common substitute
for Robert in the age of Queen Elizabeth, and long afterwards ;

* i. e. at Court.

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pellation of Lobbin; substituting, in this case, L for
R, as in the instance now before us he has substituted
W for L. The epithet " pleasant " (" our pleasant
Willy "), I may add, had here a peculiar force and
propriety ; for Lilly had been so much distinguished
for his wit and vivacity at Oxford, that one of his
adversaries has endeavoured to depreciate him on this
ground, as if his spriteliness and humour were
greater than became a scholar. When these verses
first appeared, it is reasonable to suppose that this

and was used in addressing persons high in authority and rank.
Thus Lord Essex, in a letter to Sir Robert Sidney, Governor of
Flushing, March 4, 1596-7, addresses him by this familiar ap-
pellation. (See Memoirs of the Sidneys, p. 115, Sid. Papers,
vol. i.) Nor was such an address considered undignified, or toa
familiar, when applied, on the stage, to a nobleman ; for, in The
Downfall of Robert Earl of Huntington, 4to. 1601, we find these
lines :

Alas, my Robhin, what distemper'd griefe
" Drinks up the roseate colour of thy cheekes ? "
A few years after the publication of Colin Clout, Lobbin was
so well known to have there designated Robert Earl of Leicester,
that Bishop Bedel, in a poem on the Gunpowder Plot, written, in
some measure, in imitation of the obsolete style of Spenser's pas-
torals (which lay long in manuscript, and was at length published,
for a political purpose, with a spurious title, in 1713), uses it as
a designation of another nobleman with the same Christian
name, Robert Cecil Earl of Salisbury. I quote from a MS.
among Archbishop Sancroft's papers, at Oxford, which varies, in
some measure, from the printed copy :

" I turned to hearken this matter at full ;
'* And for the rest, trust me, if you wool :
" Of many good shepheards I heard the same,
*' And from the sage Lobbins own mouth it came ;
" The wise Lobbin, that fame doth resound,
" As true a shepheard as lives on ground."

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

203

paronomasy was understood by many curious and in-
telligent readers ; and that the eulogy of Lilly, by so
great a poet as Spenser, being the subject of conver-
sation among the admirers of poetry, and the more
polished frequenters of the playhouses, induced a book-
seller to furnish the publick with copies of his plays.
Two only of his comedies had been printed six years
before, and the whole of the impressions disposed of ;
but not many months after Spenser's poem appeared,
three others, Galathea, Endymion, and Midas, were
entered in the Stationers' register, and published in
1591 and 1592 ; and at the same time the other two
were reprinted. Thus, at once, were gratified the
admirers of this celebrated poet, in London, who,
doubtless, read, with delight, those comedies which
they had often seen represented on the stage with
the highest applause ; and his less fortunate acade-
mick friends of Oxford and Cambridge, who, at that
period, had little intercourse with the metropolis, and
whose curiosity must have been strongly excited by
the extraordinary success of those scenick productions,
on which the judicious Muse of Spenser had set the
seal of learned and unqualified approbation.

It may be observed, that a few years after the
verses under our consideration were published, Dray-
ton, in like manner, eulogized Sir Philip Sidney,
under the invented name of Elphin ^ ; which was

6 " Elphin is dead, and in his grave is laid ;
'* O, to impart it how my heart it grieveth !
" Cruel that fate, that so the time betray'd,
*' And of our joys untimely us depriveth.

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THE LIFE OF

manifestly formed by a transposition of the letters in
the first syllable, or abbreviation, of his Christian
name [Phil], and of the only letters that are sounded
in the last syllable of his surname [ne] ; for the ana-

Who would not die, when Elphin now is gone,
Living that was the shepheard's true delight,
With whose blest spirit (attending him alone)
Virtue to heaven directly took her flight.
*****
" Summer's long'st day shall shepheards not suffice
" To sit and tell full stories of thy praise,
" Nor shall the longest winters night comprize
** Their sighes for him, the subject of their layes."
Idea^ the Shepheards Garland, fashioned in nine Eglogues,
4?to. 1593, Egl. vi. — (I quote, however, from the edition of
1619.)

But how is it ascertained that Elphin is the representation of
Sir Philip Sidney? The mystery is explained in Drayton's
Seventh Eglogue : describing, as appears from the context, and
the margin, Mary Countess of Pembroke, he says :

'* This is that nymph on that great western waste,
"Her flock es far whiter than the driven snow,
" Fair shepheardesse, clear Willies banks that grac'd,
** Yet she them both for purenesse doth out-go,
" To whom all shepheards dedicate their layes,
** And on her altars ofter up their bayes.

** Sister sometime she to that shepheard was,
" That yet for piping never had his peere ;
" Elphin, that did all other swaines surpasse,
" To whom she was of living things most dear ;
"And on his death-bed, by his latest will,
" To her bequeath'd the secrets of his skill."

In a marginal note on the word " Willies," the author has
added — " A river running by Wilton near to the plain of Salis-
bury."

WILLIAM SHAKSPEAIIE.

205

grammatists, as the learned in that art inform us,
claim the licence of disregarding such letters as are
silent and inefficient, in which predicament the final
letter in Sidney stands. By this process Philne was
obtained; and then, by transposition, Elphin.
Sidney also, himself (and Spenser after him), with a
similar allusion to the first syllable of his Christian
name, preferring to it a Greek word of the same im-
port with the fictitious name of his mistress [Stella],
had denominated himself Ast7'ophiL ; though, for
some reason or other, perhaps with a view to throw
a veil over the conceit, the word, in their time, was
generally written Astrophel. So common, indeed,
were these conceits, and so congenial, in this respect,
were the sentiments of Spenser's friend, Lodowick
Bryskett, that, in the elegy which he wrote on the
death of Sir Philip Sidney, having introduced an
eclogue, in which there are two speakers ; one of
them, we find, is Colin, Spenser's assumed name ;
and the other interlocutor, in compliment, we may
presume, to him, is denominated Lycon ; being
merely the metathesis or anagram of that poetical
designation.

The literal artifice by which the name of the ad-
mired dramatick poet, whom Spenser had in view,
was half divulged and half concealed ^ did not, I

^ Thus also Edmund Scory, or Scorie (who I suspect was a
god-son of Spenser's, being the'son of Silvanus Scory, from whom
probably Spenser's eldest son Silvanus derived his baptismal
name), revealed only to the curious his name, which was ** ex-
pressed and not expressed," by being thus subscribed to some

206

THE LIFE OF

conceive, escape the curious in the days of anagram
and allusion ; but, in process of time, such devices
having become unfashionable, and fallen into disuse,
the secret meaning ceased to be understood, and for a
long period he has been deprived of the fair fame
with which Spenser intended to encircle his brows.
Every thing has its day. There is a fashion in the
works of the imagination, no less than in our cloaths,
and equipage, and modes of life : and the dominions
of wit, as well as empires, have their rise and pro-
gress ; and, like them, are subject to revolution and
decay. Hence, what at one period was thought ex-
tremely fanciful and ingenious, at another, is con-
temptuously denominated a fantastick crotchet, or
verbal quibble ; or depreciated by whatever other cha-
racter or epithet, fastidiousness or refinement may have
fixed to it. But we should always keep in our thoughts
the manners, and habits, and prejudices, of the age

commendatory verses prefixed to Drayton's Heroical Epistles in
1598:

E. Sc. Gent.
Duris decus omen.
The words under the initials of his names, of which the mean-
ing is not very apparent, are an anagram, and the letters, properly
arranged, form Edmundus Scorie. Of Edmund Scory, and his
father Silvanus, who was the son of John Scory, Bishop of He-
reford, and was a patron of poets, some account may be found in
Wood's Ath. Oxon, i. 367, 682. Edmund, in 1617, was knighted:
and in the later editions of Drayton's Poems, his name is written
at length ; a circumstance which was not discovered till long
after the foregoing observation was made. He is author of a
short account of the assassination of Henry the Fourth of France,
and a eulogy on that monarch, a small quarto published in 1610.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

207

which produced the works we are reviewing. That, in
the age of Elizaheth, and her successor on the throne,
the allusive play, on names very nearly resembling
each other, which we are now considering, was perfectly
congenial to the taste of the time, may be shown by
numerous instances ; but by none, perhaps, that can
more strongly evince the popularity of this exercise of
the fancy, than a circumstance recorded of King
James, during his visit at Oxford, in 1605, about
fifteen years after The Tears of the Muses was writ-
ten : who, while he was surrounded by all the grave
and reverend sages of that famous University, in-
dulged himself in the very same conceit which Spenser
has employed in the adumbration of the distinguished
comick writer whom he has so highly eulogized ; and
his Majesty's playful substitution of one name for
another, differing only in its initial letter, however
little applause it may obtain at the present day, un-
questionably then excited no less admiration in that
learned body, than it did in their publick orator (a
celebrated scholar and wit), by whom, we find, it was
considered a very happy paronomasy, or, to use his
own words, a most sweet and pleasant allusion.

After having related that the King, on viewing
the Bodleian Library, was much struck by the assem-
blage of many thousand volumes of printed books
and manuscripts, collected, at a great expense, from
the most distant parts of the world ; and that his
Majesty thence took occasion to pay a high com.pli-
ment to the University, observing, that he had often
been presented by them with the richest fruits of
ingenuity and learning, but never before had seen the

208

THE LIFE OF

garden in which they grew and were gathered ; Mr.
Isaac Wake, to whom we are indebted for this anec-
dote, proceeds to inform us, that a bust of the
founder, which had been presented by their chan-
cellor ^, next attracted the royal visiter's attention :
" Dumque," says the orator, " intentos oculos con-
jicit in Bodlaei statuam ^ (quam ex alabastro dedola-
tam et inductis coloribus vivide representantem, illus-
trissimus cancellarius bene merito, amoris ergo, po-
suerat), suavissimd allusione ad pientissimum hoc
Bodlaei opus (lingua enim patria pri?ncB tantum
literce discrimen est inter Bodlcei nomen et Pii), eum
Thomae Godli/ nomine insignivit, eoque potius nomine
quam Bodli/ deinceps merito nominandum esse cen-
suit \" From this relation, we may safely conclude,

^ Thomas Sackville, the first Earl of Dorset.

9 Though this word is employed, the representation here de-
scribed was, in fact, only a bust, which is yet preserved in the
Bodleian Library. See Wood's Hist, and Antiq. of the Univer-
sity of Oxford, vol. ii. part ii. p. 925, ^to. 1796.

* Rex Platonicus, &c. ab Isaaco Wake, publico academiae ejus-
dem oratore, 4to. 1607, p. 116.

The following anecdote, though somewhat ludicrous, may yet
be introduced with sufficient propriety, in the discussion of so
light a subject as ancient paronomasy, more especially as it serves
to show that Spenser was by no means singular in thus playing
on the names of his contemporaries ; and that even a grave and
learned divine of the same period, who afterwards sat in the archi-
episcopal throne of Canterbury, did not think it beneath him to in-
dulge, like our British Solomon, in this species of wit. The anec-
dote to which I allude is recorded by Mr. Aubrey, in his Life of
Dr. Ralph Kettel, Master of Trinity College, in Oxford, from the
year 1598 to 1643, when he died : and oddly enough, Sir Isaac
Wake, to whom we are indebted for that related above, is here
also a principal agent.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

209

that the poet's latent meaning, in the verses which
have given rise to the present disquisition, was imme-

" I cannot (says Aubrey) forget a story that Robert Skinner,
Bishop of Oxon, told me of one Slymaker, a fellow of the college
[Trinity College, Oxford], long since. The custom was in those
days to go every Saturday night, I think, to Joshua [Joseph]
Barnes^ shop the bookseller, opposite the west door of St. Mary's,
when the news was brought from London, See. This impudent
clown would always be hearkening to people's whisperings, and
overlooking their letters,— that he was much taken notice of. Sir
Isaac Wake, who was a witty man, was resolved he would put a
trick upon him, and understood that such a Sunday Slymaker was
to preach at St. Mary's : so Sir Isaac, the Saturday before, reads
a very formal letter to some person of quality, that * Cardinal
Baronius was turned Protestant, and was marching with an army
of forty thousand men against the Pope.' Slymaker hearkened
with greedy ears ; and the next day, in his prayer before the
sermon, beseeched God of his infinite mercy and goodness to give
a blessing to the army of Cardinal Baronius, who was turned
Protestant, and was marching with an army of forty thousand
men, — and so ran on. He had a Stentorian voice, and thundered
it out. The auditors all stared, and were amazed. Abbot (after-
wards Bishop of Sarum) was then Vice-Chancellor, and when
Slymaker came out of the pulpit, sent to him, and asked him his
name. * Slymaker,' said he. * No, (said the Bishop) tis Lye-
maker.' "

One of the circumstances here mentioned may nearly ascertain
the chronology of this story. The Vice-Chancellor must have
been, not Robert Abbot, Bishop of Salisbury, as Aubrey erro-
neously supposed (that prelate never having filled that office), but
Dr. George Abbot, afterwards Bishop of London, and finally
Archbishop of Canterbury, who was Vice-Chancellor of the
University of Oxford, in 1600, 1603, and 1605 ; to one of which
periods, therefore, this anecdote must be referred. Dr. Skinner,
Bishop of Oxford, the relater of the story, was admitted into
Trinity College in 1605. Henry Slymaker became a student, at
Oxford, about the year 1592 ; took the degree of Master of Arts
in 1598, and was afterwards elected a Fellow of Trinity College.
VOL. II. P

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diately apprehended by this learned monarch, how-
ever it might have escaped the notice of such of his
subjects as were less enlightened, or less versed in
the mysterious subtilties of allusive and anagram-
matick lore. These, however, among the readers of
poetry, were comparatively so few, and the admirers
and cultivators of such conceits were so numerous,
that, doubtless, this verbal artifice, or, as Camden
calls it, " name device," was, in Spencer's time, at
least, in the metropolis, understood by many persons ;
though, at a subsequent period, it sunk into ob-
livion ^.

Aubrey gives Sir Isaac Wake the title by which he was afterwards
distinguished ; but he was not then knighted. He became a
member of the University of Oxford in 1593 ; probationary fellow
of Merton College, in 1598 ; and Orator of the University, in
1604. He received the honour of knighthood, at Royston, in
1619; and was afterwards employed as an ambassador, in Savoy,
Piedmont, Italy, &c. A further account of him may be found in
Fuller's Worthies (Norfolk), p. 286 ; and in Wood's Ath. Oxen,
p. 573.

* If it should be asked, " Why, if this matter was understood,
at least, by the curious, did no one inform posterity that Lilly
was the person here eulogized by Spenser ? " to this question I
shall reply by another. Why did not some contemporary writer
inform us who the several poets were, whom Spenser has praised
in the verses quoted in the next section, under the names of
Harpalus, Corydon, Palin, Alcon, Palemon, and Action ? all of
whom unquestionably were, at that time, known to the curious
and more enlightened perusers of Spenser's poetry. Why did not
some one inform us, when Shakspeare first came to London,
what was his original breeding and education ; what was his
father's trade ; which was his first play, and when it was pro-
duced ; what was the order and succession of his dramas ; when
h« finally left the theatre, and what fortune he acquired by it ?
Why did none of the writers, of the time, inform us, who was

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

211

While we are in quest of remote and less obvious
analogies, we sometimes overlook those immediately
before us. Of the truth of this observation, the
verses under our consideration afford a singular in-
stance ; for the similitude between the name of Lilly
and that which was substituted by Spenser in its
place, is so striking, that it is wonderful it should so
long have eluded our notice. When we advert to
the general propensity to anagram, and " a dalliance
with names," which prevailed in that age ; for Drayton,
we have seen, has his Elphin, Shakspeare his Cali^

the original author of Titus Andronicus ; who was the writer of
the old plays on which Shakspeare formed his Henry the Sixth ?
Why did no one tell us who was the author of the several plays
falsely published under his name, in his life-time ; concerning
which, he himself never took the trouble to undeceive the world?
All these were facts known to many at that time.

Sir Walter Raleigh told the clergyman who attended him, just
before he lost his head, that his adversary, Essex, had been
taken off by a trick. This trick we now know; but why did not
that clergyman, or any other of his contemporaries, inform us
what that trick was ? Shakspeare, we are told, in the contest
between him and Ben Jonson, " put him down, and made him
bewray his credit." Why did no one throw some light on this
mysterious account, and inform us how he discomfited his surly
antagonist, and transmit to us the ballad, or epigram, or lampoon,
by which this literary victory was achieved ? The truth is, our
ancestors paid very little attention to posterity : they thought
many things trifles, and unworthy of notice, which we consider
important ; and have left us in the dark about many other curious
particulars, as well as these, which, at least, the literary part of
their successors would be extremely glad to ascertain. The
biographer of our poet has, above all others, especial reason to
lament the literary penury of his contemporaries, whose admira-
tion of his genius, high as it was, never led them to transmit to
posterity any particulars of his private life, or dramatick history.

P S

21-2

THE LIFE OF

ban'^, Ben Jonson his Ond5Wfl % and other writers
similar literal and verbal devices ^ ; when Spenser's

3 The metathesis of Caliban^ for Cannibal, is obvious. And
still more appositely, in Measure for Measure, and in the Second
Part of King Henry IV. by the change of the first letter, we have
(in burlesque) Canibal, for Hanibal,

4 See Jonson's Entertainment at Althorpe, 4-to. 1603 :

*' We'll expresse in every thing
*' Oriana's well-coming."
In the margin, on the word Oriana, we find this note : " Quasi
oriens Anna,''

See also Hymensei, a masque, by the same writer, on the mar-
riage of Robert Earl of Essex and Lady Frances Howard, 4to.
1606:

" And see, where Juno, whose great name

" Is Unio in the anagram,

** Displayes her glistering state," &c.

5 Though the general prevalence of verbal devices, in the age
of Spenser, is well known, yet, as they have been long out of
fashion, it may not be improper to collect, in this place, a few
examples of these obsolete fancies.

Philip Stubbes, in the first edition of his Anatomie of Abuses,
Ivo. 1583, thoughout his work describes Anglia, or England,
under the name of Ailgna; and, about sixty years afterwards, the
distresses of Ireland were displayed in a comedy called Cola's
Fury, or Lirenda's Misery. So, Thomas Lupton, in his book
entitled Too Good to be True, &c. 4to. 1584, describes a kind of
Utopia, or country of imaginary perfection, under the awkward
metathesis of Mauqsun \_Nusquam'], and the whole dialogue (for
that is the form of his work) is carried on by two speakers, each
of whose, names is an anagram: Siuqila \_Aliquis'}, born in a
most fruitful island, called Ailgna [i. e. Anglia], and Omen
[Nemo,'} Theodore Beza, Spenser's contemporary, with whose
writings he doubtless was well acquainted, concealed himself
under the double veil of translation and anagram, substituting for
his Christian and surname Adeodatus Seba. ** Carmina ejus
(says Sir Thomas Pope Blount, in his Censura Authorum) legun-
tur. tom. iii. Delit. Gal. sub nomine Adeodati Sebse, Vesalitensis,

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 213

play on other names is considered ; and, in addition
to the remarkable and kindred paronomasy, by which
he has designated his patron, it is observed, that, in
his eleventh Eclogue, the two principal persons, sha-
dowed and eulogized under feigned denominations,
were, by a double artifice, so covertly concealed, as to
elude the researches of the poet's intimate friend and
commentator; though now, with the aid of some

sub quo latere voluit." John Penry, the well-known schisma-
tick, in 1589, impudently dedicated his Theses Martinianse to
John Cankerhury, meaning the learned and pious John Whitgift,
Archbishop of Canterbury. Thus also Orchesographies, a
curious treatise on dancing, in French (for the notice of which I
am indebted to the ingenious Mr. Douce), was published in
4to. in \5S^t hy Jean Tabouret, under the anagrammatical name of
Thoinot Arbeau. In like manner, a Dialogue between the Crosse
in Cheap and Charing Crosse, was published in 164'1, by Henry
Peacham (who was about twenty-two years younger than
Spenser), under the anagram of Ryhen Pameach : and Sir
Symonds D'Ewes, in his Memoirs of his own life, a manuscript
in the British Museum, speaking of Sir Francis Bacon's being
created Viscount St. Alban, in 1621, informs us that the wits of
the time then said, that Nabal, being folly or foolishness, and the
true anagram of Alban, might well set forth his fond and impotent
ambition." MS. Harl. 64-0. So common were these fancies in
the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. See also p. 219, n. 8
where other examples of similar literal devices will be found.

After the Restoration, Dryden, as I have shown in his Life,
shadowed his friend. Sir Charles Sidley, under the name of Lisi-
deiuSy the anagram of his surname, Latinized (Sidleius) ; and,
above a century after Spenser's verses were written. Swift con-
cealed, or attempted to conceal, the name or title of Decanus
[the Dean], under that of Cadenus ; and has employed the same
kind of conceit in his verses entitled Pethon the Great. He is,
perhaps, the last celebrated writer in whose works such fancies
are found.

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THE LIFE OF

verses which he had not seen, they may be clearly
ascertained, by a similar solution^ ; that by " well

^ Spenser's friend, E. K., in his Commentary on The Shep-
heard's Calendar (General Argument), tells us, that " to the
speciall meaning and intent of a fevo of his Eclogues he was not
privy." In the introductory remarks on the Eclogue for Novem-
ber, he observes, " In this eleventh Eclogue hee laments the
death of some maiden of great blood, whom hee calleth Dido. The
personage is secret and to me unknowne, albeit of him selfe I
often required the same : " and in his Glossary on the thirty-
eighth line, he says, ** The great shepheard is some man of high
degree ; but the person both of the shepheard and of Dido is un-
known, and closely buried in the authoufs conceiptj" This
conceit I shall now endeavour to unfold.

The ** maiden of great blood," concealed under the name of
Dido, and lamented in the eleventh Eclogue, was, I believe, an
illegitimate daughter of Robert Earl of Leicester, by Douglas
Howard Lady Sheffield, the widow of John, the second Lord
Sheffield. The great shepherd," Lobbin, is, in the Eclogue,
said to be her father , and Lobbin was assuredly Lord Leicester.
(See p. 200, n. 5.) The young lady having, I apprehend, been
christened Elizabeth (probably after the Queen, for, at the time
of her birth, Leicester and Lady Sheffield were supposed to be
married), is shadowed under the name of Virgil's Dido, or Elisa.
Her father, it should be remembered, resided much at Penshurst,
in Kent, and hence that county is made the scene of this pas-
toral :

*' Shepheards, that by your flocks on Kentish downes abyde,
*' Wail ye this wofuU waste of nature's warke,
*' The fairest flowre," &c.
(See also Three Proper and Familiar Letters, &c. ut supra,
p. 35 : " I imagine me (says Gabriel Harvey to Spenser) to
. come into a goodly Kentishe garden of your old Lords, or some
other nobleman," &c.)

Mr. "SVarton was of opinion that this Eclogue was written at
Penshurst ; a notion which adds strength to my conjecture. The
,poet had there, perhaps, seen the beautiful young maiden, whom
he laments, carried to the grave.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

215

ordering " the letters in the word Rosalinde, the true
name of Spenser's mistress may be discovered, as the

With this solution of the concealment so studiously preserved
in this Eclogue, several of the verses very exactly correspond.
The residence of the person lamented is ascertained to have been
in Kent, by the circumstance of the Kentish shepherds being
called upon to lament the maiden, " whose presence was their
pryde, — whose absence is their carke;" and the relation and
grief of a father, for the loss of a beloved daughter, is thus
clearly pointed out, though overlooked by the glossarist, E. K.
who erroneously supposed Lobbin to be the lover, instead of the
parent, of the maiden deplored :

** — — Dido is dead alas, and drent,

*' Dido, the great shepheard his daughter sheen e.

•X- -)f * * -X-

*• O thou greate shepheard Lobbin, how great is thy grief!
" Where bene the nosegayes that she dight for thee
*' The colourd chaplets wrought with a chiefe
" The knotted rush rings and gilt rosemarie ?

" For she deemed nothing too deere for thee, . . .

•X- * -X- * *

" But maugre death, and dreaded sisters deadly spight,
*' And gates of hel and fyrie f aries ferse,
" She hath the bonds broke of eternal night,
** Hersoule unbodied of the burdenous corpse :
" Why then weepes Lobbin so, without remorse ?
" O Lobb, thy losse no longer lament,
" Dido is dead, but into heaven hent."
Douglas Howard, the mother of Dido or Elisa, was one of the
daughters of William Lord Howard, of Effingham, and sister to
Charles Howard, the second Lord Effingham, and finally Earl of
Nottingham and Lord High Admiral oi England ; and the great
insult and injustice shown by Leicester to this lady, in repudiat-
ing her, for the purpose of marrying Letitia, the widow of Walter,
and mother of Robert Earl of Essex, was, perhaps, one of the
causes of Nottingham's deadly hatred to the last-mentioned
nobleman. John Lord Sheffield, her first husband, died in
January, 1569-70 ; and soon afterwards an illicit commerce ap-

216

THE LIFE OF

same contemporary friend has informed us ^ ; that^
in his seventh Eclogue he has introduced Archbishop

pears to have taken place between his widow and Lord Leicester
(Dugdale's Baronage, ii. 222), which was then considered a mar-
riage ; but which, though the ceremony is said to have been
celebrated in the presence of Mr. (afterwards Sir Edward) Dyer,
and another gentleman, she was never able to establish ; and
afterwards marrying Sir Edward Stafford, in the life-time of Lord
Leicester, she appears to have acknowledged its invalidity. The
fruits of that commerce were, I believe, this daughter, who was,
perhaps, born in 1571, and a son, born in 1573, and christened
Robert, who afterwards was well known as Sir Robert Dudley,
and finally assumed the title of the Duke of Northumberland.
His age is ascertained by his admission as a member of Christ-!
church, in the University of Oxford, in 1587, having been matri-
culated May 7th, in that year, and being then fourteen. [Acad.
Oxon. Registr.] The daughter, it may be presumed, died early
in 1578, about seven years old ; and dying so young, under such
equivocal circumstances, may not have been thought worthy of
the notice of Dugdale, Collins, or any other of our genealogical
historians. In September, 1578, Lord Leicester, while Lady
Sheffield was living, married Letice, the widow of Walter Earl of
Essex, who had died in Ireland, not without suspicion of poison,
in 1576. Spenser, from about 1579 to 1580, being in Lord
Leicester's service, probably wrote this Eclogue, to sooth his
patron's grief for the loss of an amiable child, perhaps early in
1578, and doubtless previously to his marriage with Lady Essex.
It was published in 1579. After it had been written, when
Leicester's desertion of Lady Sheffield had brought some disgrace
on him, and he and Spenser were not on the most cordial terms,
it is not surprising that our poet, though often entreated, should
not divulge, even to his friend and commentator, who the persons
meant in this pastoral were, being perhaps somewhat ashamed of
it. Nor had the commentator the same means to discover who
Lobbin was, that we have ; for the lines which I have quoted
from Colin Clout (see p. 200, n. 5), did not appear till sixteen years
after his Commentary was written. He was, however, guilty of
a great oversight in supposing the great shepheard, Lobbifi,'*

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

217

Grindal under the denomination of Algrind\ and,
hy metathesis, Bishop Aylmer, Elmer, or Elmor (for

the lover, instead of the father, of the maiden lamented ; a notion
which the context shows to be perfectly unfounded.

Some months after the preceding note was written, I met
with a strong confirmation of my hypothesis in the celebrated
libel entitled Leicester's Commonwealth, originally published in
1584- : *' But after this, his lust compelling him to another place,
lie [Leicester] would needs make a post contract with Lady
Sheffield, and so hee did, begetting two children upon her ; the
one a boy called Robin Sheffield, novo living, some time brought
up at Newington, and the other a daughter, born, as is knowen,
at Dudley Castle." The words " now living," applied, in con-
tradistinction, to Robin Sheffield (as the writer [the well-known
Robert Parsons] chooses to call him), informs us, that his sister
[our Dido] was then dead. At the birth of this child, if we may
believe the author of that piece, some deception had been prac-
tised by Leicester, or Lady Sheffield, in procuring her sister.
Lady Dudley, the wife of Edward Lord Dudley, to pretend to be
with child, and to be delivered at Dudley Castle ; which shows,
that this was Lady Sheffield's Jirst child by Leicester ; for had her
son, Robert, been previously born and acknowledged, any such
;artifice, at a subsequent period, would have been needless.

As a shepherd of the name of Thenot is introduced more than
once in the Pastorals of Spenser, what 1 am now about to observe,
is certainly not entitled to much weight, nor indeed does my
hypothesis, in my apprehension, stand in need of any additional
support : yet I cannot forbear to remark, that the poet, when
in his eleventh Eclogue he had occasion to introduce two speakers,
himself and another, might have thought that Thenot was an
interlocutor peculiarly suited to bear a part in an elegiack dia-
logue on the death of Dido, or Elizabeth Dudley ; nothe, the
anagram of his name in the French language, with which Spenser
appears to have been very conversant, signifying an illegitimate
child. By the laws of anagram, where the same letter occurs
jtwice in a name, one of them may be disregarded.

7 See the Glosse on the first Eclogue, by E. K. probably Edward

218

THE LIFE OF

so variously was his name written), under that of
Morel; and that, in other parts of his works, con-
Kirk e, who was of Caius and Gonville College, in Cambridge; and
having taken the degree of Bachelor of Arts in IS?^, and of Master
of Arts in 1578, was (as I learn from the Grace-book of that
University), it may be presumed, one year younger than Spenser.
*' Rosalinde is also a feigned name, which, being loell ordered,
will bewray the verie name of his love and mistresse, whom by
that name he coloureth." The writer of Spenser's Life, published
in 1758, with some probability, conjectures that the lady's name
was Rose Linde ; a family of that name, as appears from Fuller's
Worthies, having been settled in Kent (where Rosalinde
resided), in the time of King Henry the Sixth. Rosalinde's real
name, however, may have been Elisa Horden, the aspiration
being omitted, and Ordn serving in the place of Orden; a licence
which the framer of such an enigmatical conceit would not scruple
to take. *' The precise in this practise," says Camden, ^'strictly
observing all the parts of the definition [of an anagram], are only
bold with (fi) either omitting it, or retaining it, for that it
cannot challenge the right of a letter. But the licentious, some-
what licentiously, lest they should prejudice poetical libertie, will
pardon themselves for doubling or rejecting a letter, if the sense
fall aptly; and think it no injurie to use e for cb, vfor tu, 5 for
z, and c for Jc, and contrariwise." Remaines, 4to. 1605,
p. 168. Thomas Horden, as well as Mr. Linde, was a gentle-
man of Kent, in the time of Henry the Sixth. The Glossarist's
observation seems to denote a transposition of letters, which
Rosa, or Rose Linde, does not require. " There is," says
Drummond of Hawthornden, in the composition of an anagram,
transposition ; because, if any sense be in the name of letters
not transposed, it is not so much an anagram as equivoque, as
Anna Grame, — anagram :

*' What needs an anagrame,

*' Since that her very name is Anna Grained
If it should be said that to the construction of this anagram it
is necessary that the lady's Christian name should be written
with an s, instead of a z; Elisa, and not Eliza; the answer,
without claiming the license granted by Camden, is, that such

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

219

ceits of the same kind may be found ^ ; when all
these fancies of this great poet, and others, his con-
was Spenser's classical orthography. So, near the conclusion of
The Tears of the Muses :

** Most peereless prince, most peereless poetresse,. . , ,
** Divine Elisa — ."

Again, in his Prothalamion :

" Divine Elisaes glorious name may ring."

Her Majesty's usage, however, was different ; for she wrote
her name Elizabeth. Spenser's orthography was founded on
classical authority.

^ As we have Lohbin, for Robbin, or Robin ; Willy, for Lilly ;
Rosalinde, for some unknown person (whether Rose Linde or
Elisa Horden) ; Morel^ for Elmor, or Elmer; and Algrind, for
Grindal ; so, in Colin Clout's Come Home Again, Amaryllis yq-
presents Alice, Countess of Derby, the first and last four letters
of Amaryllis answering, in sound, to her Christian name, the
intermediate letters being rejected ; and this circumstance, it may
be presumed, induced Spenser to distinguish her by that name ;
for, as she is represented as the wife of Amyntas, he would pro-
bably, but for this conceit, have called her Phillis, instead of
applying that name to her sister, Elizabeth Lady Carey ; the
loves of Amyntas and Phillis having been recently celebrated by
Watson, in an admired 'poem. In like manner, the fictitious
name, Theana, which in Colin Clout represents Anne,
Countess of Warwick, may have a reference to her Christian
name. So, in the fourth Eclogue we have Bellibone, by meta-
thesis, for Bonnibel : and, in The Faery Queen, Belphebe re-
presents Queen Elizabeth ; because Sir Walter Raleigh had
called her Cynthia ; Phebe, as well as Cynthia, being one of the
names of Diana. So also, in the Prothalamion, 4to. 1596,
written on the marriage of Lady Elizabeth and Lady Catharine
Somerset, he has indulged himself in the same kind of conceit
which dictated the various fanciful denominations above enume-
rated ; and, in his description of these ladies, he has condescended
thus to play on their surname:

*' For sure they did not seeme

*' To be begot of any earthly seede.

220

THE LIFE OF

temporaries, shall have been considered, they cannot,
I conceive, but add such strength and support to the

*' But rather angels, or of angels kinde ;

" Yet were they bred of somers heat^ they say,

" In sweetest season, when each flower and weede

"The earth did fresh array."
Nor was this kind of paronomasy peculiar to Spenser. One
of his patrons, and a very admired poet, Sir Edward Dyer, by a
similar conceit, has mysteriously divulged his own name, near
the conclusion of one of his poems, of which there are two ancient
manuscript copies at Oxford ; one in the Bodleian Library, the
other in the Ashmolean Museum :

" Yet is my woe not feignde
" Wherein I sterve and pyne ;
*' Who feeleth most, shall finde his least.
Comparing his with mine.

*' My song, if any aske

" Who's grievous case is suchy

" Di/ er thou let his name be knowne, —

*' His folly shewes to [too] much."

This poem is very corruptly printed among those ascribed
erroneously to William Earl of Pembroke and Sir Benjamin
Rudierd, in which volume the letter P, prefixed to several copies
of verses, merely denotes that they were printed from a transcript
in Lord Pembroke's hand-writing, not that they were his com-
positions. At that time, it was much the fashion to transcribe
in a fair paper- book, the most popular poetical productions of the
day, while they yet continued in manuscript ; and by frequent
transcription they became very corrupt. To this common prac-
tice Drayton alludes, in the preface to his Polyolbion, 1612 : *' In
publishing this essay of my poem, there is this great disadvantage
against me, that it cometh out at this time, when verses are
wholly deduc't to chambers, and nothing esteemed in this luna-
tique age, but what is kept in cabinets, and must only passe by
transcription,"

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

221

various circumstances which have been mentioned, all
tending to show that Lilly alone could have been the

In like manner, in The Looking Glasse for London and Eng-
land, written by Thomas Lodge and Robert Greene (mentioned
below), the cruel and brutal son who treats his parents, Alcon
and Samia, with neglect and contempt, and refuses them any
succour in their utmost need, is called Radagon, by metathesis,
from a dragon. And in Lodge's Fig for Momus, a collection of
Epistles, Satires, 8cc. 4to. 1595, we find the poet himself intro-
duced under the name of Golde [Lodge], and two of his contem-
poraries, Roydon and Deering, under the names of Douoroy and
Ringde. So, in a Collection of Poems, written, at various
times^ between 1615 and 1635, a manuscript in my possession,
in a Replie to Mr. RandoU's [Thomas Randolph's] Verses on the
Losse of his Finger, we find that poet's name thus anagramma-
tized :

" Muse, ere we part let wyttie Arnold know,

** Haud pulchrum est monstrari digito."
How far the mystery of anagram was carried, may appear from
one by Hugh Holland, on the initials of the two names of
Edmund Bolton, which is much more enigmatical than any of
Spenser's :

" Mr. Hugh Holland to his learned friend Mr. E. B. the author,
upon his Elements of Annorie ;
— Here no need is of my sorry charmes
" To boast it, though my braines Apollo warmes ;
•* Where, like in Jove's, Minerva keeps a coile ;
" Yet I, a drone, shall but thy hony spoile,
" That art the maister — BE of all the swarmes.*'

Commendatory Poem prefixed to Elements of Arm.
4to, 1610.

The writer's conceit here would, perhaps, never have been
discovered, but for the following marginal note, on the words —
" Maister BE," the last two letters being carefully distinguished
by capitals :

" E. B. [i. e. Edmund Bolton] ^er anagrammatismumyel meta-
thesin."

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THE LIFE- OF

comick writer here alluded to, that I trust I shall not
incur the charge of critical temerity, or presumption,
in supposing that no douht whatsoever can hereafter
be introduced on this subject.

I am perfectly aware how open and exposed these
inquiries are to the petty assaults of shallow buffoons
and half-witted scoffers ; whose gross ignorance of
the manners and customs of our ancestors is such,
that they cannot even comprehend why the bequests
of an ancient will are noticed, or how any useful in-
formation can be derived from circumstances ap-
parently trifling and unimportant ; and who, there-
fore, will be always ready, with the aid of that glim-
mering of knowledge which they possess, and such
barren jests as they can glean from worthless common-
place books, to ridicule disquisitions like the present.
But they may be assured that they lose their labour,
which, of however little value, might yet be better
employed ; and, at the same time, their feeble artillery
is wholly misdirected; for, if any ridicule belongs
to these subjects, it should attach itself to those great
authors, who, though their works will live for ever,
indulged themselves, sometimes, in conceits ^ which

9 As so much has been said in this section concerning ana-
grams^ and name-devices," which are as old as the time of
Lycophron, it is but justice to Spenser to advert to the opinions
vi^hich very generally prevailed in his time on this subject, and
particularly to quote the sentiments of the grave and judicious
Camden on these playful conceits.

After having explained the nature of anagram, he adds, "But
some of the sower sort will say, it is nothing but troublous joy;
and because they cannot attaine to it, condemne it, lest by com-
mending it thev should discommend themselves. Others, more

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

223

cannot be developed without such investigations.
Judicious readers will always justly appreciate and
highly approve of disquisitions tending to illustrate
the history and writings of the most distinguished
poets which England has produced, and the manners
and usages of their times, even though such disquisi-
tions should occasionally deviate from more important
topicks to the explication of verbal artifices, latent
paronomasies, or forgotten anagrams ; nor will they

milde, will grant it to be a daintie devise, and disport of wit,
not without pleasure, if it be not wrested out of the name to
the reproach of the person. And such will not deny, but that
as good names may be ominous, so also good anagrammes, uoitk
a delightfull comfort and -pleasant motion in honest mindes ; in no
point yielding to many vaine pleasures of the body. They will
also afford it some commendation in respect of the difficultie
{difficilia quce pulchra), as also that it is a whetstone of patience
to them that shall practise it [and also our antiquary might
have added, to them that shall develope it"]. For some have beene
scene to bite their penne, scratch their head, bend their browes,
bite their lips, beate the boord, teare the paper, when they were
faire for somewhat, and caught nothing herein. If profound
antiquity, or the inventour may commend an invention, this
will not give place to many." After various observations and
examples, the same writer, in conclusion, adds, *' But here it
is time to stay; for some of the sowre sort begin to laugh
at these, when as yet they have no better inlight in anagrammes,
then wise Sieur Gaulard, who, when he heard a gentleman
report that he was at supper, where they had not only good
company and good cheare, but also savoury epigrammes, and
fine anagrammes, he, returning home, rated and belowted his
cooke, as an ignorant scullion, that never dressed or served up
to him either epigrammes or anagrammes. And as for these
sowre surlings, they are to be commended to Sieur Gaulard,
and hee with them joyally to their cookes and kitchen stuffe."
Camden's Remaines, 4to. 1605.

224

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ever receive coarse ribaldry arid saucy folly, for wit ;
or vapid petulance and frothy inanity, for good sense,
reason, and argument.

SECTION XIII.

Though the preceding observations have perfectly
satisfied my own mind, and, I doubt not, will impress
a similar conviction on my readers, it was not, I must
acknowledge, without a considerable degree of regret,
that I found, by the success of my own researches, a
strong obstacle placed against indulging in the pleas-
ing notion, that the two great poets of the age of
Elizabeth lived in mutual harmony and friendship
with each other, as far as Spenser's short visits to
England during his latter years would admit. The
modest and humble Shakspeare appears not to have
thought his praise of any value ; and therefore, while
all the poets of the time were complimenting each
other \ we do not find a single encomium on a con-

' Ben Jonson has praised Selden, Donne, Sylvester, Breton,
Chapman, Drayton, Broome, &c. Donne has praised Jonson.
Sir John Davys has praised Spenser, Chapman, Daniel. Chapman
has encomiastick verses on Jonson, Fletcher, Beaumont. Davison
has most extravagantly praised Daniel, placing him above Spenser.
Beaumont has eulogized Ben Jonson. Brown and Withers have en-
comiastick verses on Drayton. Abraham Fleming has commended
Whetstone. We have an eulogy, by Nashe, on Greene, Peele,
Roydon, and Acheley ; by Peele, on Spenser, Wilson, Mar-
lowe, Greene, and Whetstone ; by Harrington, on Constable,
Daniel, Bustard, Davys, and Turberville ; by Drayton, on Drum-
mond, Lord Sterling, and many others ; by Lodge, on Lilly,
Nashe, Sylvester, Daniel, and Drayton ; by Davies, of Hereford,

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

226

temporary writer^ subscribed with the name of our
great dramatist : and indeed so few are the addresses
or allusions to him, that one is led to suspect, that
though he was very highly estimated, his age did not
set a sufficient value on his transcendent abilities.
But that Spenser, who has mentioned and praised
many of the makers of his time, after Shakspeare had
acquired a considerable degree of celebrity, should
have been wholly silent concerning such a phenome-
non, may seem so improbable, as to weaken in some
degree the force of the foregoing remarks ; and indeed
almost made me distrust my own hypothesis, till, by
a very careful perusal of all his smaller pieces, I dis-
covered that he was not insensible to the merits of his
illustrious contemporary ; and, by a singular coinci-
dence, the covert manner in which he is noticed, above
four years after The Tears of the Muses was pub-
lished, and the period at which he is referred to, in a
passage that has hitherto escaped the observation of
all the commentators and editors of both these poets,
affords a strong confirmation of what has been already
suggested, — that Shakspeare was not the dramatick
writer eulogized in that poem, and indirectly
strengthens the explication of that eulogy given in
the preceding pages.

on Roydon, Daniel, Shakspeare, Fletcher, &c. ; and by Fitz
Geoffrey, on Spenser, Sidney, Daniel, and Drayton. Drayton
has commended Middleton, Chapman, Sir John Beaumont, and
others.

^ A paper of verses, in which Spenser's deep conceit is praised,
has been attributed to Shakspeare, but erroneously ; for it was
written by Richard Barnefield. See Shakspeare's Poems,

vol. XX.

VOL. II. Q

226

THE LIFE OF

I Spenser, whose history, like that of many of our
celebrated English writers, is involved in a mist of
confusion and error ^, published at London, in 1595, or
consented to the publication of, a poem, called Colin
Clout's Come Home Again. The subject of this
piece is his own return to his humble mansion at Kil-
colman, in the south of Ireland, after having visited
London in company with Sir Walter Ralegh, to
whom the poem is addressed; who, in April, 1589,
having been " chased from the English court " by
Lord Essex ^ had retired to his estate in the county
of Corke, from whence he made an excm-sion to Spen-
ser's castle, which was situated in the same county.
This production, however, may have taken its rise
from some visit of Ralegh to Ireland, at a later
period ; and even if it alluded to that of 1589, it was
written some years afterwards. To the Dedicatory
Epistle the printer has erroneously affixed a false
date : " From my house of Kilcolman the 27 of De-
cember ^, 1591 ;" for the poem itself was composed un-

^ This was written several years before the late edition of
Spenser's Works, by the Rev. Mr. Todd, had appeared.

* Birch's Memoirs of Queen Elizabeth, i. 53.

5 It is not easy to ascertain the precise time, in 1594-, when
this poem was written. That it was written after April, 1594, is
certain, for the reason given in the next page of text. The lines
relative to the death of Lord Derby, —

** But since I said he is, he quite is gone," &c.
would lead us to suppose it written recently after that event. Yet
the verses, in which his widow is said to be freed from the yoke of
Cupid, since tvkick she dreads to engage in a second marriage,
seems to imply that some months had elapsed since she lost her
husband. Daniel's Cleopatra, a tragedy, was published in

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 227

questionably after the middle of 1594, and perhaps in
the December of that year ^ This error of the date,
which, so far as Shakspeare has any connexion with
this piece, is a material consideration, is ascertained
by the verses that it contains, addressed to Alice,
Countess of Derby, under the name of Amaryllis, to
whom, by the title of Lady Strange, The Tears of
the Muses had been dedicated. She had now ^ be-
come a widow by the death of her husband, Ferdi-
nand, the fifth Earl of Derby, who enjoyed that title
little more than six months, dying April 16, 1594 ^
To this event the poet has particularly alluded. The
error of the date of this poem is also ascertained by
Spenser's Daphnaida, published in 1596, the Epistle

1594 ; but I doubt whether it had reached Spenser's hands, when
he composed his eulogy on that poet. If he had known that
Daniel had already attempted "tragick plaints and passionate
mischance," he scarcely would have contented himself with say-
ing that this poet was likely to excel in some performance of that
kind. Unluckily there is no entry of the poem in question in the
Stationers' register, which might throw some light on this
inquiry. I am, therefore, only able to state the doubts on each
side.

^ The allusion to Daniel's Sonnets, which did not appear till
1592, furnishes another proof of this errour, and the allusion to
Ralegh's disgrace a fourth.

7 As it has become a fashion for hypercriticks, when they quote
the works of others, to re-write them, to guard against any such
ovei-weening and crotchet correction, I think it proper to say,
that this word is here used deliberately, and that I think noto
more elegant than then in this place.

^ The writer of the Life of Spenser, prefixed to Church's
edition, places the death of this nobleman erroneously in 1595,
and appears to have led Mr. Warton into the same errour. See
his Milton, p. Ill, second edition.

Q 2

228

THE LIFE OF

Dedicatorie of which is dated " London, the first of
Januarie, 1591 ;" i. e. 1591-2 ; for this poet could not
have affixed his name to a dedication at Kilcolman
in Ireland, on Dec. 27> 1591? and five days after-
wards write another dedication in London.

In this pleasing pastoral, Spenser, under the name
of Colin, after having given an account of his visit to
the court of Elizabeth, and drawn a striking contrast
between the peaceful, well-ordered, and happy land of
England, and the then wild and barbarous country to
which his hard lot had led him, breaks out into a pa-
negyrick on his Sovereign, by whom, as he here re-
lates, he had been highly favoured ; her Majesty, her-
self a great poetess (if there be truth in song), having
allowed him to recite to her some of his verses. — " If
she be so great a poetess (replies Alexis, one of his
companions), what need has she of so simple a versifier
as you ? Perhaps, however (adds he), the poets of
the time are either too lazy to write, or such worth-
less rhymers, as not to be entitled to descant on so
lofty a theme, and hence she condescended to hear
Colin's minstrilsey." In reply to this observation,
Spenser takes occasion to enumerate and commend
many of the flourishing metricians of the time, some
of whom are expressly mentioned, while the greater
part are concealed under fictitious names and the
dark veil of description.

" Ah, nay, said Colin, neither so, nor so,
*^ For better shepheards live not under skie,

" Nor better hable, when they list, to blow
" Their pipes aloud, her name to glorifie. —

" There is good Harpalus, now waxen aged,
" In faithful service of faire Cynthia ; —

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

229

" And there is Corydon, though meanly waged.
Yet hablest wit of most I know this day. —
*' And there is sad Alcyon, bent to mourne,
*' Though fit to frame an everlasting dittie,
** Whose gentle spright for Daphne's death doth tourn
Sweet layes of love to endlesse plaints of pittie 9.
" Ah pensive boy, pursue that brave conceipt *
" In thy sweet eglantine * of Meriflure 3 ;

9 We have here another instance of Spenser copying himself.
In his eleventh Eclogue we find :

*' Sing now, ye shepheard's daughters, sing no mo
" The song that Colin made you in her praise,
*' But into Doeeping turn your wanton layes.''

* Of this uncommon formula we have an example in Holy Writ,
1 Kings, xviii. 7 : ** And as Obadiah was in the way, behold,
Elijah met him : and he knew him, and fell on his face, and said.
Art thou that my lord Elijah ?"

^ In an arbour of eglantine or sweet-briar. Arbours formed of
this sweet-scented shrub were then common. See Lilly's
Euphues and his England, signat. H 4, (b.) 4to. 1580 :

*' Fidus, calling these gentlemen up, brought them into his
garden, wher under a sweet arhour of eglantine, the birds re-
cording their sweet notes, he also strained his olde pipe," &c.

Again, in A briefe and pleasant Discourse of Duties in Ma-
nage, called The Flower of Friendshippe, by Edmond Tylney,
8vo. 1568 : *' — at whose returne we went into the garden, a
place marvellous delectable, wherein was a passing faire arbour j
at the entrance whereof, on eche side, sprong up two pleasaunt
trees, whose greene leaves much delighted our eyes, and were sup-
ported with statelye pillers, curiously painted with divers de-
vises. All the whole arhour above over our heades, and on eche
side, was potvdred with sundrie Jlowers, and wreathed above with
the sweete bryer or eglantine, between the braunches whereof
the chereful sunne layde in his beames here and there ; so that
the heate did not molest us, neyther did the sunne want, to cheere
us. W^hat shall I say? it might be called a terrestriall paradise."

Spenser's own authority, however, will most decisively prove

THE LIFE OF

Lift up thy notes unto their wonted height,

That may thy Muse and mates to mirth allure.—

that by the words, " In thy sweet eglantine" such an arbour was
intended to be described. See the Faery Queen, b. xi. c, 5, st. 29 :
And over him, art, stryving to compare
" With nature, did an arbour greene dispred,
*' Framed of wanton yvie, flouring fayre,
*' Through which the fragrant eglantine did spred
*' His prickling armes, entrayld with roses red,
" Which dainlie odours round about them threw ;
" And all within with flowres was garnished,
*' That, when mild Zephyrus amongst them blew,
*' Did breathe out beauteous smels, and painted colors shew."
This description, we see, was not drawn from the stores of
Spenser's imagination, as has been supposed : he merely described
an elegant arbour of his own time.

3 Mr. Gorge had estates in Devonshire, Cornwall, and Mid-
dlesex : but Merijlure, which does not occur as the designation
of any land in the inquisition taken after his death, is not the
name of any place in those counties, or in any other county in
England, and was unquestionably a fictitious denomination in-
vented for the occasion. We have seen Spenser so often in-
dulging himself in fanciful denominations, that this combination
will not seem more strange than many others which have been
noticed. Merijlure, I conceive, was formed from the French
words rime (meri), and Jleur (Jlitre), both anagrammatized ; and
thus considered, the poet's exhortation to his friend,

*« _ pursue that brave conceipt,

** In thy sweet eglantine of Meriflure,"
means nothing more than — ' Complete that fine poetick work
which you have begun, in thy arbour, embellished not only with
eglantine or sweet-briar (the usual ornament of bowers, see p. 229,
n. 2), but also with the choicest Jlowers of verse, or, in other
words, consecrated to poesy:' for Spenser, following his master,
Ariosto, generally, if not always, uses rime as synonymous to
verse. So, in his Eclogue for October :

" Thou know'st not, Percie, how the rime should rage
and in that for November :

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

231

" There eke is Palin, worthie of great praise,
** Albe he envie at my rustick quill ; —

Up, griezlie ghostes, and up, my rufull rime ! "
Again, in The Tears of the Muses :

*' Then fittest are those ragged rimes for me."
in French, rime had the same meaning: and in that language
he found Jieur d'age, signifying, as in the equivalent expression
in our own, the flower or prime of a man's age ; Jleur de farine,
the finest meal ; and Jieur dhuyle^ the first and richest drop-
pings of the olive or grape before they are pressed. So, in Eng-
lish, in his own time (1568), a popular book was published by
Edmond Tilney, afterwards Master of the Revels, under the
title of the Floiuer of Friendship ; and about the same time ap-
peared The Flotver of the Ten Commandements. While
Spenser was a student at Cambridge, Gascoigne published a col-
lection of his poems, under the title of " A hundreth sundry
Flowers," 8cc. He might also in the formation of this word have
had in view the well-known collection of Greek Epigrams, en-
titled AN0OAOriA, and the Latin Flores Poetaru7n; in
imitation of which works, a collection of miscellaneous poetry by
different authors appeared a few years after Colin Clout, under
the title of '* Belvidere, or the Garden of the Muses," in the
preface to which the editor says, that every man may be fully
satisfied, I have set down both how, whence and where these

Jlotvers had their first springing, till they were drawn together
into the Muses' garden" The flowers here spoken of were the

^flowers of verse, and therefore, by an easy fiction, these poetick
effusions may have been supposed to have been poured forth in
arbours of a similar construction to that which is here called
Merijlure,

In another poem he makes mention of the bowers devoted to the
Muses, such as that which he has here appropriated to his friend ;
** — arbours stveet, in which the shepheard swaines
** Were wont so oft their pastorals to sing."
Lydgate has " the Jlouier of knighthood," and ** the Jlotner of
tttorthinesse ;" and Spenser himself, " the Jlower ofchivalrie," and

232

THE LIFE OF

" And there is pleasing Alcon, could he raise

" His tunes from layes 4 to matter of more skill. —

** the Jlotjoers of courtesie and in this very poem he calls Fer-
dinando Earl of Derby, under the name of Amyntas, *' tlie flotver
of shepheards.'' In his Teares of the Muses, we find a similar
Jbrmula still more resembling the latent meaning couched under
the invented word before us :

*' But I, that in true tragedies am skil'd,

" The jio*vore of wit, finde nought to busie me !"

The combination of ideas, therefore, which gave rise to the
word Meriflure, we see, was perfectly congenial to his general
train of thought and phraseology elsewhere.

With respect to the former part of this fictitious denomination,
meri, or rime anagrammatized, it may be observed, that Fontenelle,
in like manner, with the variation of only one letter, about a cen-
tury afterwards published a satirical history of Rome and Geneve,
under the anagram of Mero and Enegu.

The anagram of Rome, a word little different from that under
our consideration, was, I believe, not unknown to Spenser :
Cur varios turn diu remoratur Roma clientes ?
Forte, quod inverso nomine Roma mora est.

I may add that the known adumbration of Bishop Elmor (or
Aylmer) under the name of Morel, gives countenance to the
metathesis now suggested, which in the word rime is effected by
the same process, namely, by making the first and second syllables
of each word change places ; and a similar compounded name in
an ancient romance, Blanchefleur, was doubtless familiar to Spen-
ser's ear.

Nor was the foreign termination of the fictitious name which he
has chosen to introduce here (perhaps chiefly for the sake of the
corresponding rhyme), wholly unknown to his countrymen; for,
for many centuries previous to the dissolution of religious houses
in the time of Henry the Eighth, subsisted, in Cardiganshire, the
Abbey of Stratflure, or Struijlure (strata Jtorida), an abbey of
Cestercian monks. See Dugdale's Monasticon, iii. 893.

4 " Layes" are songs. It is observable that the same kind of
praise is given a few years afterwards to Shakspeare, who un-

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 233

And there is old Palemon, free from spight,

" Whose carefull pipe may make the hearer rew;
" Yet he him selfe may rewed be, more right,

" That sung so long, untill quite hoarse he grew. —
" And there is Alabaster throughly taught

" In all this skill, though knowen yet to few ;
*' Yet were he known to Cynthia as he ought,

** His Eliseis would be redde anew.
" Who lives that can match that heroick song

*' Which he hath of that mightie princesse made?
*' O dreaded dread 5, do not thy selfe that wrong

" To let thy fame lie so in hidden shade ;

But call it forth, O call him forth to thee,

*' To end thy glorie, which he hath begun :
*' That when he finisht hath, as it should be,

** No braver poeme can be under sun ;

accountably is represented by his eulogist as a mere penner of
love-verses, when he had produced at least fifteen of his incom-
parable plays :

" Who loves Adonis' love, or Lucrece' rape,
•* His sweeter verse contains heart-throbbing strife,
" Could but a. graver subject him content.
Without love's foolish lazy languishment."

Return from Parnassus, 4to. 1606 ; but written
about the end of the year 1602.
5 Surely there is here some errour of the press. I cannot but
think the poet wrote " O dearest dread." So, in the conclusion
of his address to the same personage, prefixed to the Faery Queen:
*' The which to heare vouchsafe, O dearest dread, awhile/'
The same form of expression is found also in book ii. c. 2, st. 30;
and book iv. c. 8, st. 17. So also, in his Hymn of Beautie:
" And you faire Venus' dearling, my dear dread."
Sir Henry Sidney begins one of his letters to Queen Elizabeth
thus — " Most feared and beloved," which is precisely Spenser's
"dearest dread." So also, Sir Richard Gresham's Petition to
King Henry VIII. (1535), Bib. Cotton. Cleop. E IV. fol. 122,
*' My most dradd, beloved and natural! sov'aigne." O dreaded
dread," has no meaning.

THE LIFE OF

*' Nor Po nor Tybur's swans, so much renown'd,

" Nor all the brood of Greece so highly prais'd,
*• Can match that Muse, when it with bayes is crown'd

*' And to the pitch of her perfection rais'd. —
" And there is a new shepheard late up sprong,

" That which doth all afore him far surpasse;

Appearing well in that well-tuned song,
Which late he sung unto a scornfull lasse :
" Yet doth his trembling muse but lowly flie,

*' As daring not too rashly mount on hight,
" And doth her tender plumes as yet but trie,

*' In love's soft laies and looser thoughts' delight.
*' Then rouze thy feathers quickly, Daniell,

*' And to what course thou please, thy selfe advance ;
*' But most me seemes, thy accent will excell

" In tragick plaints and passionate mischance. —
*• And there that shepheard of the Ocean is,

** That spends his wit in love's consuming smart :
" Full sweetly temperd is that muse of his,

*' That can enipierce a princes mightie hart.

There also is, ah no, he is not now,

'* But since I said — he is, he quite is gone,
*' Amyntas quite is gone and lies full low,

" Having his Amaryllis left to mone :
** Helpe, O ye shepheards, helpe ye all in this,

" Helpe Amaryllis this her losse to mourne :
** Her losse is yours, your losse Amyntas is ;

'* Amyntas, fioure of shepheards pride forlorne.

He, whilst he lived, was the noblest swaine
That ever piped in an oaten quill ;
*' Both did he other which could pipe, maintaine,

*' And eke could pipe him selfe with passing skill.—*

And there, though last, not least, is Action,

" A gentler shepheard may no where be found ;
*' Whose Muse full of high thoughts' invention,

** Doth like him selfe heroically sound. —
** All these, and many others mo remaine

*' Now after Astrofell is dead and gone ;
** But while as Astrofell did live and raine,

" Amongst all these was none his paragone.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

2:35

'* All these do florish in their sundry kynd,

** And doth their Cynthia immortall make ;
** Yet found I lyking in her royal mynd,

•* Not for my skyll, but for that shepheards sake."

Though probably at the time when these verses
were published, all the poets here alluded to under
fictitious names, were well known to the more en-
lightened class of readers, they can now be discovered
only by conjecture. Indeed, at the first view, the
inquiry concerning them seemed to me quite hope-
less ; for many years ago, when I consulted the late
Mr. Warton on this point, expecting that his various
and profound researches into the history of the poetry
and poets of that age might furnish some aid towards
overcoming this difficulty, he told me that nothing
had occurred in the course of his reading, which could
throw any light upon the subject. Since that period,
however, a minute and very careful investigation of
all the circumstances and facts, supplied by the lines
themselves, has enabled me to dispel a great part of
the artful obscurity in which these persons were in-:
volved, and to point them out with, at least, a consi-
derable degree of probability.

The first poet alluded to, under the description of
the " aged Harpalus," was doubtless Thomas Church-
yard % at that time above seventy years old. He had

^ *' Thomas Churchyard (says Oldys in his manuscript notes on
Winstanley's Lives of the Poets) was born about the year 1520;
at the age of seventeen (1537) came to King Henry's court; had
served in the wars abroad, and was subject at home, under eight
crowned heads : had also been in the service of two or three of
the noblest families in England : had dedicated books to about

236

THE LIFE OF

been a writer of poetry, in the reign of Henry the
Eighth ; and for some years lived in the service of

twenty great personages of fortune and distinction : yet with his
fighting and writing, loss of much blood and time in camps and
courts, in a fearful and fruitless attendance and dependance upon
the ungrateful great, for above sixty-seven years, he never could get
more than a very scanty pension from Queen Elizabeth, so scanty
that upon the death of Dr. John Underhill, Bishop of Oxford, one
of his best friends [1589], he had no better prospect of sustaining
himself to the end of his natural course, than [by] exposing again^
in 1592, his aged and scarified limbs to the hardships of war in
foreign service ; yet did struggle on to salute King James with a
Congratulation upon his entrance, printed 4to. 1604-. He was a
most grateful man in receiving kindnesses, and in celebrating the
merits of the dead."

Oldys, in the foregoing statement, seems to' have thought that
Churchyard had obtained a pension before 1589 ; but he was
mistaken. See note 8.

A copious account of Churchyard's Works may be found in
Herbert's edition of Ames's Typ. Antiq. vol. iii. p. 1806. His
poem, entitled The Mirrour and Manners of Men, which was
published in 1594-, was written fifty years before; hence it ap-
pears that he was an author so early as 1544?, the 36th year of
Henry VIII. His last publication appeared in 1604?, and was ad-
dressed to King James, under the title of A blessed Balme to
Search and Salve Sedition ; to which was added '* A Pean Tri-
umphal upon the King's Publick Entry," &c. He died in the
same year, and was buried in the church of St. Margaret, West-
minster. See Weaver's Fun. Mon. p. 497.

It appears that Nashe, in some pamphlet, now unknown, had
reflected upon Churchyard ; for in his Apologie of Pierce Pen-
nilesse, 4to. 1593, (signat. H 4. b), he complains that Gabriel
Harvey had reproached him with cri/mg thh poet mere?/. "This,"
he says, " could not be done but with an intent to stir him up to
write against Churchyard afresh, which nothing under heaven
should draw him to do." I love you" (adds Nashe, addressing
Churchyard,) oinfainedly, and admire your aged Muse, that

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

237

Henry Earl of Surrey ; and he has himself told us,
that among the Miscellaneous Verses, by various au-
thors, appended in 1557, and in subsequent editions,
to the poems of that accomplished and unfortunate
nobleman, many of his productions are to be found.
Here we meet with one, entitled " Harpalus' Com-
plaint of Philladaes love bestowed on Corin which
was deservedly admired ; and being, I suppose, well
known in Spenser's time to be written by Church-
yard, he denominates him from the hero of the piece.
He had now been long in the service of Queen
Elizabeth, here denominated " fair Cynthia," and
recently (January 27? 1592-3), had obtained from
her Majesty a pension of eighteen pence a-day ^, or

may well be grandmother to our grand eloquentest poet, at this
present.

Sanctum et venerabile vetus omne poema.
" Shore's wife [inserted in The Mirrour for Magistrates] is
yong, though you be stept in yeares : in her shall you live when
you are dead." Churchyard, in return, speaks highly of Nashe,
in his New Years Gift to Queen Elizabeth, 1593.

7 Mr. Warton has reprinted this poem entire in the third vo-
lume of his Hist, of Eng. Poet. p. 57, with the following high
eulogy : ** From the same collection, [Churchyard's Challenge,]
the following is perhaps the first example in our language of the
pure and unmixed pastoral ; and in the erotick species, for ease
of numbers, elegance of rural allusion, and simplicity of imagery,
excels every thing of this kind in Spencer, who is erroneously
ranked as our earliest English Bucolick."

8 " Pat. 35 Eliz. p. 4. Jan. 27. Elizabeth by the Grace of
God &c. To All Men to whom &c. Greeting. — Knowe Ye that
Wee for certen good Causes and Consideracons us hereunto
specially moving. Of our Grace especiall, certen Knowledge, and
meere Mocon, Have Gyven and Graunted and by these ^sentes
for us our Heyres and Successors Doe Gyve and Graunte to our

238

THE LIFE OF

27/. 7^. 6d. per annum ; which, small as it was, was
not punctually paid \ In the patent granting this

Welbeloved Svante Thomas Churchard Gent A certen Aiiuytye
or Pencon of Eiejhteene Pence of good and lawful! Money of
England by the Day ; To have hold receave and enjoy the
said Pencon of Eighteene Pence of lawfull Money of England by
the Day unto the sayde Thomas Churchard and his Assignes
during his naturall Lyfe, from the Feaste of Saynte Michaell last
past before the Date hereof, of the Treasure of us our Heyres and
Successors at the Receyte of the Exchequer at Westm' of us
our Heyres and Successors by the Hands of the Treasorer and
Chamberlaynes of us our Heyres and Successors there for the
Tyme being, at four usuall Feastes or Tearmes of the Yeere by
even Porcons yerely to be payde Although ex^sse mencon &c. In
Witnes whereof &c. Wytnes our selfe at Westm'. the xxvij'^'
Day of January [1592-3]. p Breve de Privato Sigillo, &c.

* His pension^ we have seen, was to commence from Mi-
chaelmas, 1592 ; yet near the close of the following year, he had
received nothing, as appears from a letter in the Lambeth Library,
written by Mr. A. Standon to Antony Bacon, and dated " Wynd-
sore, the xvij*** of November, 1593," from which I transcribed
the following postscript :

*• I sende you, S'. here, fower of Churchyard's chyldren whiche
he hatche in coUo' [choler], after he could not obtaine of one a
thinge her Ma*'", had granted him ; which verses came to her
handes.

" Madame,

You bid your Tresorer on a tyme
** To gyve me reason for my ryme;
** But synce that tyme and that season
*' He gave me nether ryme nor reason."

MS. Lamb. 649, p. 267.
These lines furnish one of many proofs of what I have had fre-
quent occasion to observe, that all the traditional stories con-
cerning our English poets are to be examined with the greatest
caution, being frequently either wholly unfounded, or blended
with gross fiction ; for on the fact above-mentioned, a circum-
stantial tale respecting Spenser and Lord Burghley has been

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

239

little annuity, which I discovered in the rolls, and
have examined on the present occasion, he is expressly
named the Queen's servant.

By Corydon was certainly meant Abraham Fraunce,
a poet of considerable learning, who, from various
circumstances, we may be assured, was a friend of
Spenser's. In 1588, he had published, in quarto, " The
Lamentation of Corydon for the Love of Alexis,'*
being a translation of Virgil's second Eclogue, in
English hexameters ; which appears to have given
occasion to the poetical designation here employed.
This piece he afterwards annexed to his Lawyer's
Logike, which appeared in the same year ; and it
was again reprinted and attached to his poem, entitled
" The Countess of Pembroke's Ivy Church ^ " in

constructed; which first appeared in the folio edition of that
poet's works in 1579, and has been repeated a hundred times
since, though totally void of truth. It is, however, just as well
founded as another tale, which has been as often told : — that his
first introduction to Sir Philip Sidney was, by presenting him with
a canto of his Faery Queen, with which Sidney was so delighted,
that he ordered his steward to give the unknown author fifty
pounds : and having increased his bounty as he read on, urged
him to make haste, otherwise he should be in danger of giving
away his whole estate. Were not this tale disproved by other
circumstances, the verses subscribed with the initials W. L. at
the end of the Faery Queen alone would shew that it also is a
mere fiction ; for it appears from them that it was on the sug-
gestion of Sidney, Spenser undertook that poem ; and he had him-
self dedicated his Shepheard's Calendar to Sidney, and by that
means became acquainted with him in or before 1578.

* This title, I believe, has not been understood. Ivy Church
appears to have been one of the seats in Wales belonging to
Henry Earl of Pembroke, husband to this Countess. See the
next note.

240 THE LIFE OF

1591. Abraham Fraunce appears to have been born
about the year 1564, in or near Shrewsbury, in which
town and neighbourhood, several persons, of the
same name, in lower life, yet remain. His father's
Christian name I have not been able to discover ; but
he appears to have been a burgess of Shrewsbury,
and probably, like our poet's father, was a glover.
Abraham Fraunce, the person of whom we are now
speaking, was bred at the free-school of Shrewsbury,
of which the celebrated Mr. Ashton was master ; and
his name stands the twenty-fifth in the list of admis-
sions, for January, 1571, in the register kept by that
gentleman. He appears then as a burgess. At this
school. Sir Philip Sidney was bred, and laid the
foundation of his friendship with Foulke Greville
(afterwards Lord Brooke), they both being admitted
into it on the same day ; several years, however,
before the admission of Fraunce.

His friendship and connexion with Spenser, it may
be presumed, began at an early period ; for Fraunce,
like him, was honoured by the patronage of Sir
Philip Sidney, by whom he was sent to St. John's
College, in Cambridge, in 1579; where, for a long
period, he was supported by his bounty. Here he
resided eight years ; and, after his patron's death, he,
in 1587, removed to Gray's Inn, to study the law.
In 1590, by the favour of Henry Earl of Pembroke,
who had married Sidney's sister, he was, we have
reason to believe, made the Queen's solicitor at the
Council or Court of the Marches in Wales ^ ; a situa-

3 These few particulars concerning Abraham Fraunce I have
principally collected from his own works, and from a letter in the

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 241

tion in which he was certainly but " meanly waged ; "
the salary of his office amounting only to ten pounds
a-year While he was an under-graduate at Cam-
Museum, written by Henry Earl of Pembroke, Lord President of
the Council in the Marches of Wales, to the Lord Treasurer
Burghley, dated at Ivy Church, the xxvth of August, 1590. After
having named certain persons as proper to fill vacant offices in the
Court of the Council in the Marches of Wales, he proceeds thus :
— " Yet least the indifferency I use may argue me to conceave an
equality in them whose names I deliver, I have to this my servaunt
[Massenger] imparted mine opinion of every one. Yf it fall out
that I preferre them who are by blood, kindred, alliance, or in
other respectes, nearest my selfe, yet I assure your P that my
comendation proceeds of a sufficientie in them, not of partial
affection in me

*< Since the death of M' Amias, her Ma** Sollicitor at the
Counsaill in the Marches, no man is appointed to that service.
There is in that court M"" Abraham Ffraunce, a pleader at the
barre. He was bred by my brother Sir Phillip Sidney long in
Cambridge ; continued afterwards in Graies Inne, untill he was
called to the barre. I conceave him in eche respect a man suffi-
cient for that service. Yf it will therefore please your 1p at my
hartie request to co'mend him to her Ma*'% I shall thinke my selfe
pleasured therein." MS. Harl. 6995, article 35. This office,
which doubtless Fraunce obtained on suche a recommendation,
had been held by Thomas Phaer, Esq. the well-known translator
of Virgil, who died in 1563.

4 See Peck's Desid. Curios, vol. i. p. 52, 4to. How small a
provision ten pounds a year (which may be estimated as equal to
forty pounds a year now) was then considered, may appear from a
passage in Churchyard's Dedication to King James, prefixed to
his Blessed Balme, 4to. 1604', in which he speaks of the pension
granted to him by Queen Elizabeth, which was, we have seen,
27/. 75. ^d. per ann. (equal perhaps to 100/. a year now) as a very
poor stipend. " The good queen gave me (says he) a jpoore
pension for this service, and so calling to mind in four princes'
times I have given a great push for preferment, yet I was never

VOL. II. R

242

THE LIFE OF

bridge, he presented his early patron (in 1581) with
a small discourse on logick, which he afterwards en-
larged : and, he tells us, he " read the perfect copy"
(in publick, I suppose), " three times over, at St.
John's, and three times at Gray's Inn." It was,
originally, he informs us, " A Discourse on the Use of
Logick ^, and a contracted Comparison between this of
Ramus, and that of Aristotle ; " but when he changed
his situation, and, from a Cambridge student, became
a lawyer, he altered the title of his book, and called
it the Lawyer's Logick. " Yet," says he, " because
many love logike, that never learne lawe, I have re-
teyned those ould examples out of the new Shep-

advanced ; I bethought me of the fifth king, since the other four
left me only to & poor pension."

5 It should seem from the following manuscript note by Oldys
in his copy of Largbaine's Account of the Dramatick Poets, that
a Latin treatise on logick by Fraunce is yet in existence :

"The thin MS. in folio, an original written and adorned by
A. Fraunce and dedicated to his Mecaenas, Sir P. Sidney, in two
parts ; the one containing his Discourse upon logick, in Latin
prose^ about twenty-two pages ; the other a collection of heroick
symbols (in forty leaves) of princes and other illustrious persons
of Italy, France, and Spain, then of the greatest fame in Europe ;
having their emblems all curiously drawn with his own pen, and
Latin verses written under them, with explanations in prose.
Bound in a white vellum cover adorned with gold, containing a
landscape on one side of iEneas's voyage in Virgil, lib. 4, tollite
me, Teucri, for the motto, and on the other side, eight Latin
verses upon Vive, Vale. In Dr. Rawlinson's possession, 30th of
April, 1750." As Dr. Rawlinson bequeathed his MSS. to the
Bodleian Library, this might have been expected to be found
among them ; but the Rev. Mr. Price, after a careful search,
could not discover it in that very valuable repository. It is,
therefore, probably, in some private hands.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 243

liearcl*s Kalendar [Spenser's celebrated work], which
I first gathered, and thereunto added those also out of
our law-books, which I lately collected Neither
his English hexameters, nor this odd and motley
mixture of law, logick, and poetry, will, I fear, much
raise Abraham Fraunce in the opinion of a reader of
the present day. But he must be estimated by the
notions which prevailed in his own time, and by the
judgment of his contemporaries ; among whom the
praise of Spenser cannot but cast some degree of
splendour around his name. The absurd kind of
metre in which several of his English compositions
are written, he appears to have adopted, on the au-
thority of his patron. Sir Philip Sidney, for whom he
had so great a veneration, that, in his treatise enti-
tled (perhaps with allusion to Sidney's celebrated
work), " The Arcadian Rhetoricke ^" published in
1588, he has made him his great English exemplar,
on almost every topick, both in prose and verse ;
and here, also, we find The Faery Queen quoted,

<5 " The Lawyers Logike, exemplifying the prsecepts of logike
by the practise of the common lawe," 4to. 1588, dedicated to
Henry Earl of Pembroke, in fourteen syllable verse.

7 The full title of this very scarce book is — " The Arcadian
Rhetorike, or the prsecepts of rhetorike made plaine by examples,
Greeke, Latin, Englishe, Italian, French, Spanish, out of Homers
Ilias and Odissea ; Virgil's ^glogs, Georgikes, and iEneis ; Sir
Philip Sidnie's Arcadia, Songs and Sonets ; Torquato Tassoes
GeofFredo, Aminta, Torrismondo ; Salust his Judith and both
his Semaines ; Boscan and Garcilassoes Sonnets and iEglogs."
It is dedicated " to the right excellent and most honourable ladie,
the ladie Marie Countess of Pembroke," in six Macaronick vei-ses.

The 24th chapter of the first book of this tract is of Para-
nomasia."

R 2

244

THE LIFE OF

though neither that poem, nor the Arcadia, was then
pubhshed ; a circumstance which ascertains that
Spenser lived on terms of intimacy with Fraunce,
and gratified him with the perusal of a portion of his
great poem, while it yet remained in manuscript.

Thus we see these poets were connected and en-
deared to each other, by various ties, and by con-
genial studies. Spenser, who, in compliment to
Sidney, had himself made some English verses " halt
ill on Roman feet," was not only attached to Fraunce,
in consequence of his connexion with that extraordi-
nary and accomplished man by whom he was bred,
but must also have been highly gratified by the flat-
tering circumstance of his having exemplified most of
his logical precepts, in a book of near three hundred
quarto pages, by quotations from The Shepheard's
Calendar.

Another work of Fraunce's yet remains to be men-
tioned, which was also given to the publick in 1588,
in quarto, and is entitled " Abrahami Fransi Insig-
nium, Armorum, Emblematum, Hieroglyphicorum et
Symbolorum, quae ah Italis Impresse nominantur,
Explicatio. Quae Symbolicse Philosophiae postrema
Pars est." In the first part of this learned work,
which is dedicated, in a Latin quatrain, to Robert
Sidney, the brother of Sir Philip, he has introduced a
very elegant translation, in Latin hexameters, of
Homer's beautiful description of the shield of Achilles,
in the eighteenth book of the Iliad. From this, and
his other works, he appears to have been a very excel-
lent and general scholar, having made himself master
of the Greek, Latin, Italian, Spanish, and French

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

245

languages ; and, therefore, well merited the high
praise here bestowed, by Spenser, on his talents and
erudition, in the couplet in which he is shadowed :

" And there is Corydon, though meanly waged,
*' Yet ablest noit of most I know this day."

Alcyon, who is next mentioned, is ascertained by
another of Spenser's poems to have been Arthur
Gorge, or Gorges ^, " a lover of learning and virtue,"
for whom he has himself told us he had " particular
good will \" This gentleman had married Douglas
Howard, the daughter and heir of Henry Howard,
afterwards Viscount Bindon ; on the death of which
lady in 1590, Spenser wrote a poem, in January,
1591-2, entitled Daphnaida, and addressed to He-
lena, Marchioness of Northampton, then the wife of
Sir Thomas Gorges, a kinsman of Arthur. In that
poem, as in the verse before us, the lady of Mr.
Gorges is lamented under the name of Daphne. The
designation (Alcyon) here given to her disconsolate
husband, was evidently formed by rejecting the final
letter in Alcyone, and thus converting a female name
into that of a man : and Spenser may be presumed
to have adopted it with a reference either to Alcyone
the wife of Meleager, who died of sorrow for the loss
of her husband ; or of Alcyone the wife of Ceyx,
king of Thrace ; who, according to the fable, being
overcome with immoderate grief for his death, was,
in compassion to her sufferings, converted by the

^ The original and true name is Gorge. Gorges was merely a
corruption, arising from the common English habit of annexing
the letter S at the end of surnames,

' Dedication to Daphnaida, 4to. 1596.

246

THE LIFE OF

gods into the bird called a king's-fisher What
" the brave conceit" was, which Mr. Gorges had
begun in his happier days, and which he is here ex-
horted to resume in the sweet scented arbour of Me-
riflure ^, it is now, I fear, too late to inquire. Of

* The story of Alcyone, the wife of Ceyx, had been familiarized
to the English reader ; for in 1569 was published " The tragicall
and lamentable hystorie of two faithfull mates, Ceyx kynge of
Trachyne and Alcyone his wife &c. drawn e into English meeter.
By William Hubbard." It is also found in Golding's translation
of the eleventh book of Ovid's Metamorphosis.

3 In 1588, when England was threatened with an invasion by
Spain, Arthur Gorges, together with Ralegh, Sir Charles
Blount, Edward Vere Earl of Oxford, and others, served as
volunteers on board the English fleet (Camden, Eliz. ii. 576) ;
and he afterwards accompanied his kinsman, Sir Walter Ralegh,
in Essex's great expedition against the islands Azores, where he
was wounded. His wife, Douglas Howard, who was daughter to
Henry Howard, Esq. afterwards Viscount Bindon, was baptized
January 29, 1571-2 (Lysons's Environs of London, iii. 499), and
died June 13, 1590 [Esc. Amb. Gorges, 42 Eliz. n. 139], pro-
bably not very long after her marriage, leaving one daughter.
Ambrosia, who is also celebrated by Spenser (Daphnaida,
5ig;nat. I.), and who died 10th of October, 1600 [Esc. ut supra].
Mr. Gorges must have married his second wife in or before Sep-
tember, 1597 ; for his son William was baptized at Chelsea,
May 30, 1599 (Lysons, ii. 122) ; and he had, by the same lady,
an elder son, Arthur, who succeeded to his estate on his death
(Esc. 2 Car. p. 3, n. 169). He had four other sons ; Tymo-
leon, baptized in the same parish, October 1, 1600; Egremon,
Carew, and Henry (Esc. ut supra). He represented the county
of Dorset, in the parliament that met in November, 1592, and
was knighted, by Queen Elizabeth, in 1597. In right of his first
wife, Mr. Gorges acquired an estate in Dorsetshire, which, on
the death of his daughter Ambrosia, devolved on her maternal
uncle, Thomas Viscount Bindon (Esc. 42 KViz. n. 139). In right

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 247

his lighter poetical effusions, I believe few have been
transmitted to posterity ; though while he was yet
living, we are told by one of his sons, in the middle

of his second lady, he became possessed of the manor house of
Chelsea, which had belonged lo Sir Thomas More.

In the Epistle Dedicatory to Lucy Countess of Bedford, pre-
fixed to his translation of Lucan, sexto, 1614, his son Carew,
who was then a school-boy, speaks thus of his father's works : ** I
remember this sentence in my Pueriles, Voluntas, uhi desunt
vires, est laudanda ; where power is wanting, the good wyll is to
be accepted : which, I presume, will be my warrant in presenting
your ladyship with this poem, which by chance I did see in my
father's study, amongst many others of his manuscripts : and
because it lay idly there, I desired him to give it to me." With
this request, he tells us, his father complied. It is strange that
in this translation the author should have employed the verse of
eight syllables, a measure generally appropriated to the lighter
kinds of poetry, and extremely unsuitable to the original. His rela-
tionship and intimacy with Ralegh procured a copy of commenda-
tory verses prefixed to the translation of Lucan, and signed
W. R., which have escaped the notice of his biographers. Put-
tenham, in his Arte of Poesie, 4to. 1589, p. 190, has quoted two
lines from a poem, ** by Maister Gorge," which do not do him
much credit. The lines, however, may serve to ascertain the
author of the piece, if it be yet in being, and published anony-
mously. I have never met with any other poetical production of
Arthur Gorges, either in print or manuscript, except those here
mentioned. In 1611, he published " A transcript and explanation
of his Majesty's Letters Patent for creating an Office called Publick
Registers of general Commerce." In 1619, he gave the world a
translation of Bacon's Sapientia Veterum, and in the same year a
translation of Bacon's Essays ; both into French. He died at
Chelsea, September 28, 1625 (Esc. ut supra), and was buried
there, on the 10th of October (Lysons, ii. 122). His eldest son.
Sir Arthur Gorges, was also a poet. See the Collection of
Verses on the Death of Lord Hastings, 8vo. 1650.

248

THE LIFE OF

of the reign of James the First, that many of his
productions were then preserved in manuscript ; and
in 1614, his translation of Lucan was published,
which probably was begun many years before, and
was, I suspect, " the brave conceit " alluded to by
Spenser. His grief for the death of Daphne, how-
ever deep at the time, does not appear to have lasted
many years after these verses were written ; for in or
before the year 1597, he married a second wife, Eli-
zabeth, a daughter of Henry Clinton, Earl of Lin-
coln, by whom he had afterwards several children.

** There eke is Palin, worthie of great praise,
" Albe he envie at my rustick quill."

Palin is doubtless the abbreviation of Palinode ^,
which Spenser has used as the name of a shepherd
in his fifth Eclogue ; and, I conceive, was here in-
tended to represent George Peele, a distinguished poet
of that time, who was nearly of Spenser's age, and
had commenced a poetical writer about the same time
with him ^. He is thus denominated on the same
principle which appears to have guided the author in
the choice of several of the adumbrations found in
these verses, in consequence of Peele's having pub-

4 Verses, by Peele, are prefixed to Watson's Sonnets^ pub-
lished in 1581.

5 The title of Peele's pastoral, which is extremely scarce, is
" An Eclogue Gratulatorie, entituled to the right honorable and
renowmed Shepheard of Albion's Arcadia, Robert Earle of Essex
and Ewe for his welcome into England from Portugal!, " 4to.
1589.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

249

lished, in 1589, a high eulogy on Lord Essex, a no-
bleman for whom Spenser had the greatest respect.
In this piece the interlocutors are Piers and Palinode^.
Of Peele's various productions in the course of the pre-
ceding fifteen years, which are alluded to as " worthy
of great praise," it is not necessary to say any thing
in this place, as some account will be given of them
hereafter.

At this distance of time it is not easy to say to
what part of Peele's conduct Spenser alludes, in the
qualification of his encomium on this poet : but, I
imagine, he was displeased at his having been per-
sonally introduced on the scene, under his assumed
name of Colin, in a dramatick pastoral entitled The
Arraignment of Paris, written by Peele, and repre-
sented before Queen Elizabeth in or before 1584.
As Spenser's unfortunate passion for the lady whom
he has concealed under the nam^e of Rosalind, was,
after the publication of his eclogues, well known, the
application of this character to the new poet^ as he
was then called, must have been immediately made
by the spectators, and he had some reason to be of-
fended at being exhibited on the scene, as a hapless
swain, actually dying for love ; in addition to which
serio-comick representation, his fellow-shepherds, Hob-
binol, Diggon, and Thenot, bring his corpse on the
stage, and while they are proceeding to his interment,
sing a funeral dirge over it. " The pangs of despised

^ Palin is used as the abbreviation of Palinode, by Peele, in
his Eclogue Gratulatorie, &c. 4?to. 1589 :

" Twit me with boldnes, Palin, as thou wilt," &c.
In like manner, Spenser uses Hobbin for Hobbinol.

260

THE LIFE OF

love,'* however they may affect the bosom of pining
youth, exciting but little sympathy in the mass of
mankind, this exhibition had certainly a tendency to
place him in a ludicrous light, and is perhaps al-
luded to under the words,

" Albe he envie at my rustick quill."

He may, however, also have had in view Peele's not
very successful imitation of his rustick pastorals, in the
piece above mentioned, a performance of which per-
haps this poet had boasted as equal or superior to the
admired prototype on which it was formed.

Under the name of Alcon, who is exhorted to at-
tempt something of a higher strain than love-verses, I
believe was shadowed Thomas Lodge, then a student
in physick, and an admired poet; a man whose
learning and profession Spenser must have respected.
Alcon, like Corydon, is one of Virgil's shepherds ;
but Spenser, while he employed this pastoral name,
thus familiarized to every classical reader, appears to
have had particularly in his contemplation a very po-
pular play, entitled The Looking-glasse for London
and England, and written by Lodge in conjunction
with Robert Greene, then deceased. In this drama,
which had been frequently performed in 1591, and
the following year^, one of the characters is named
Alcon ^. The moral and religious turn of this pieced

7 This appears from the MS. register of Philip Henslowe. See
the History of the English Stage, vol. iii.

^ The practice of thus denominating authors by names taken
from their works, was not uncommon in that age. Thus Hetiry

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 251

probably, particularly recommended it to Spenser,
and induced him to take Lodge's poetical name from
thence rather than from any of his other productions.
Lodge had also written a great number of lays or
short amatory poems, some of which are found dis-
persed in his various novels ^, and some published un-
mixed with prose ; and the advice here given to him
to attempt " some matter of more skill," appears to
have had due weight ; for in the middle of the year
1595, he gave the publick a small volume of moral
satires and epistles ^ Previously to the appearance of

Chettle, in a miscellaneous piece, consisting of prose and verse,
entitled England's Mourning Garment, &c. 4to. 1603, shadows
Marlowe the poet under the name of Musceus; because he had
translated the poem of Hero and Leander, attributed to Musseus :
and Robert Greene, under the name of Musidore^ doubtless from
his having been the author of Mucedorus, a play, which has
been absurdly attributed to Shakspeare.

* This religious play represents the abominations and reforma-
tion of the Ninevites ; and the prophet Hosea, and Jonah, are
two of the Dramatis Personge ; the latter of whom is cast out of
the whale's belly on the stage.

* Scillea's Metamorphosis, 4to. 1589; Euphues Golden
Legacie, 4to. 1590; Phillis honoured with pastoral sonnets, elegies,
and amorous delights, the Life and Death of William Longbeard,
4to. 1593, &c. In the middle of the year 1594, Lodge pub-
lished a piece of "more skill," entitled The Wounds of Civil
Warre, or the true Historic of Marius and Sylla, a tragedy; but
I doubt whether it had reached Spenser's hands, when these
verses were written.

3 This very rare piece is entitled A Fig for Momus, containing
pleasant Varietie, included in Satyres, Eclogues, and Epistles,
by T. L. of Lincolnes Inne, Gent. It was entered in the Sta-
tioners' register, April 2, 1595. Mr. Warton, in the unpub-
lished fragment of the fourth volume of his History of English
Poetry, p. 81, seems to doubt whether Lodge ever published any

252

THE LIFE OF

Colin Clout, he had propitiated Spenser by a paper
of verses, prefixed to a collection of sonnets and
elegies, published in 1593, which is now so ex-
tremely rare, that I shall subjoin the Induction to it
(as it is called) in a note, on account of the high and
very elegant eulogy on Spenser that it contains,
which well entitled Lodge to this great poet's notice*.
Palemon is the poet next introduced :

" And there is old Palemon, free from spight,
*' Whose careful pipe may make the hearer rew ;
*' Yet he himself may rewed be more right.
Who sung so long untill quite hoarse he grew."

From these verses it appears that the person here al-
luded to was somewhat advanced in years, though not
yet, like Harpalus, " waxen aged ; " — that he had
long been a votary of the Muses; — and that his
writings were distinguished for their moral tendency.
These considerations induce me to believe that Ar-
thur Golding was the poet in this place in Spenser's
thoughts, a very voluminous writer, who was at
this time about sixty years old, and had been a
" maker" so early in the reign of Elizabeth as 1565,
when he published a poetical version of the first four

satires. The above-mentioned miscellany, it appears, had not
fallen into his hands.

4 There is a copy of this poem in the library of Emmanuel
College, in Cambridge ; and another, which had belonged to
the late Dr. Farmer, is now in the valuable collection of Richard
Heber, Esq. of Brazen-nose College, Oxford, to whom I am
indebted for the following specimen of it :

** Phillis, honoured with Pastorall Sonnets, Elegies, and
Amorous Delights. Whereunto is annexed the tragicall Com-
playnt of Elstred," 4to. 1593. I have never seen or heard of more

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

253

books of Ovid's Metamorphosis, in the then popular
measure — fourteen syllable verse. In 1567 he gave

than two copies of this collection of poems. The Induction is as
follows :

THE INDUCTION.

" I that, obscur'd, have fled the sceane of fame
** Intitling my conceits to nought but care,
" I that have liv'd a Phoenix in lovers flame,
*' And felt that death I never would declare.
Now mount the theater of this our age,
" To plead my faith and Cupid's cursed rage

*' Oh you high sp'rited paragons of witte f

" That flye to fame beyond our earthly pitch,

" Whose sence is sound, whose words are feat and fitte,

** Able to make the coyest eare to itch,

** Shroud with your mighty wings that mount so well,
*' These little loves new crept from out the shell.

" And thou, the true Octavia t of our time,

" Under whose worth beauty was never matched,

The genius of my Muse and ragged rime,
" Smile on these little loves but lately hatched,

" Who from the wrastling waves have made retreate,
** To pleade for life before thy judgement seate.

And tho' the fore- bred brothers § they have had,
" Who in their swan-like songs Amintas wept,

* The author had, in the preceding year, gone on a voyage
with the celebrated navigator Cavendish,
t Spenser's Daniel, &c.

X Mary Countess of Pembroke (as I conceive), a patroness
of poets, and sister of Sir Philip Sidney ; as Octavia was the
sister of Augustus, and patroness of Virgil .

§ Doubtless Thomas Watson and Abraham Fraunce. The
former, in 1585, had sung the Complaints or Lamentations of
Amyntas for the Death of Phillis ; and hence Lodge calls Wat-

254

THE LIFE OF

the publick a complete translation of the fifteen books
of that work ; to which he prefixed a poetical epistle

" For all their sweet-thought sighes had fortune bad,
*' And twice obscurM in Cinthia's circle slept,
*' Yet these, I hope, under your kind aspect,
*' Most worthy lady, shall escape neglect.

*' And if these infants of mine artlesse braine
*' (Not by theyr worth, but by thy worthinesse)
*' A meane good liking of the learned gaine,
*• My Muse enfranchis'd from forgetfulnesse

*' Shall hatch such breede in honour of thy name
" As moderne poets shall admire the same.

** As moderne poets shall admire the same ;
** I meane not you, you never-matched men
*' Who brought the chaos of our tongue in frame
** Through these Herculean labours of your pen :
" I meane the meane, I meane no men divine,
But such whose feathers are but waxt like mine.

" Go weeping truce-men in your sighing weedes,

" Under a great Mecaenas I have past [plas't] you ;

" If so you come where learned Colin * feedes

*' His lovely flocke, packe thence, and quickly haste you:

** You are but mistes before so bright a sunne,
" Who hath the palme for deepe invention voonne.

" Kisse Delia's hand, for her sweet prophet's f sake,
" Whose not affected, but well couched, teares
*' Have power, have worth, a marble mind to shake
*' Whose fame no iron age or time out-weares ;
" Then lay you down in Phillis' lap, and sleepe,
*^ Untill she weeping read, and reading weepe.

son's verses— ^rmer loves ; the collection of poems to which this
is the introduction, being also in honour of Phillis. Abraham
Fraunce, in 1 587, had published a poetical translation of Watson's
poem, under the title of The Lamentation of Amyntas for the
Death of Phillis ; of which the only copy that I have seen is in

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 255

of about six hundred lines, dedicated to the Earl of
Leicester, wherein the moral of all the stories is phi-
losophically expounded. The rehgious cast of some
of his poetical pieces and of very many of his prose
works, I conceive, gave rise to the epithet here em-
ployed,—" Whose careful pipe may make the hearer
rew ;" in which line Spenser perhaps had particularly

the Bodleian Library. Watson was dead before 1592. His very
rare poem, in Latin hexameters, entitled Amyntas Thorase Wat-
soni Londinensis, I. V. Studiosi, consists of eleven parts, each
entitled Querela (Prima, Secunda. &c.), and the last ends with the
death of Amyntas.

Spenser also has eulogized these fore-bred brothers in his
Faery Queene, b. iii. c. 6, st. 45 :

" Sad Amaranthus made a flower but late,

** Sad Amaranthus, in whose purple gore
** Me seemes I see Amintas* wretched fate,
*^ To whom sweet poets' verse hath given endless date."
In a note on this passage, in the last edition, the learned
editor concurs with Mr. Upton in supposing Sir Philip Sidney to
be the person meant under the name of Amintas ; but, unquestion-
ably, that was not the case : and Mr. Church was equally mis-
taken in supposing that by Amyntas was here meant Thomas
Watson, the author of the poem already mentioned ; for though
Spenser frequently shadowed some of the contemporary poets
under the titles of their productions, or the names mentioned in
them, that manifestly was not his meaning here ; the Amintas in
these lines being certainly the poetical and imaginary person who
is supposed to have died for the love of Phillis; that Amintas, to
whom ** the verse " of those sweet poets [Watson and Fraunce]
(for the word is not the genitive case singular, but plural), had
given never-ending celebrity. The last line, — ** To whom," &c.
compared with Lodge's verses in honour of the same persons, and
with their respective poetical productions in 1585 and 1587
proves decisively that this is the true interpretation of this con-
troverted passage.

* Spenser. t Daniel.

256

THE LIFE OF

in his thoughts, Goldiiig's translation of Beza's Mys-
tery, or, as he terms it, " tragedie of Abraham's Sacri-
fice," originally published in 1550, and exhibited by
Golding in English verse in 1577. Spenser might
also have had in his thoughts, " the Psalmes of David
and others, with Beza's Commentary ;" published by
Golding in 1571, if that work were in verse, which I
am unable to ascertain, never having seen it.

Between the years 1562 and 1595, he gave his
country an English translation of Ovid's Metamor-
phosis, Caesar's Commentaries, Justin, Seneca de
Beneficiis, Julius Solinus, and Pomponius Mela ;
and published about twelve pieces, chiefly translations
from the French, and most of them of a religious
complexion. ^

From the general cast of thinking in many of this
poet's numerous pieces, he seems to have been a rigid
Calvinist ; a circumstance which may have recom-
mended him to Leicester and Lord Burghley, in whose
family he appears at one time to have lived. He was of
a gentleman's family, and born in London, about the
year 1535, as I conjecture ; for he became a fellow
commoner of Jesus College in Cambridge, in or
before 1552. I know not the exact time of his
death, but I suspect that it happened some time
between 1596 and 1606. It must be recollected, that
all the poets here alluded to, are spoken of as then
living, except Amyntas, whom, though dead, and
consequently incapable of singing the praises of
Elizabeth, the poet has introduced by a happy artifice
of language, from his affectionate attachment to the
nobleman shadowed under that appellation. In

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

257

forming a conjecture, therefore, concerning each of
the individuals alluded to, it is, in the first place?
necessary to show that he was then living. That
Arthur Golding was alive when this poem was pub-
lished, is ascertained by his dedication of the " Poli-
ticke, Morall, and Martiall Discourses of Jaques
Hurault," to William Lord Cobham, which is dated
Jan. 27, 1595-6. Being now a versifier of above
thirty years standing ; and having, it would seem,
obtained but little emolument from his labours; he is,
with sufficient propriety, described as having sung so
long as to have become hoarse * ; and as an object of

♦ ** Yet he himself may rewed be more right,
" That sung so long untill quite hoarse he grew."
Spenser himself may, perhaps, supply the best comment on
these lines. See his tenth Eclogue :

" Cuddy. Pierce, I have piped earst so long with painCv
" That all mine oaten reedes bene rent and wore ;
" And my poore Muse hath spent her spared store,
" Yet little good hath got and much less gaine."
Cuddy, or Cuthbert, was meant to designate a poet of that
name, and a friend of Spenser's. See Three proper, &c. Letters,
4;to. 1580, p. 40. Indeed, from a sonnet of Bishop Hall, yet
preserved in manuscript, it should seem that all the interlocutors,
introduced by Spenser in his Shepheard*s Calendar, were not
imaginary persons, but his own poetical contemporaries :
** Not all the shepheards in his Calendar,
" Though learned shepheards they, and seen in song —
The same observation has been made by the Rev. Mr. Todd, in
his late edition of Spenser, who also coincides with me in sup-
posing Corydon to have meant Abraham Fraunce. But the
present and preceding section were written some years before
Mr. Todd's edition of Spenser appeared, and read by my friend
Mr. Bindley.

VOL. II. S

258

THE LIFE OF

compassion in consequence of being but ill provided
for in his old age, notwithstanding his unwearied and
pious endeavours to benefit mankind by his moral and
religious productions. He does not appear to have
entered into controversy with any of his contempo-
raries ; and the general object of the greater part of
his writings being the promotion of virtue and piety,
he may be presumed to have well deserved the pro-
mise here given by our moral poet, that of being
" free from spight ; " in opposition to Palin, whose
malevolence had recently been noticed. Like
Abraham Fraunce, he was endeared to Spenser (whose
friendly attachments appear to have had considerable
weight in several of these eulogies), by his connexion
with Sir Philip Sidney ; by whom Golding was so
much respected, that Sidney having begun a trans-
lation of Philip Mornay's work, " concerning the
trewnesse of the Christian religion," which he did
not live to complete, he desired that it should be
nished by Golding, who, in conformity to his pa-
tron's wishes, published that piece in or before 1592.

All the shadowy and allusive denominations hi-
therto examined, have been found to be significant
and appropriate ; either taken from some peculiar cir-
cumstances in the history of the writer alluded to, or
from the poetical compositions of the persons whom
they were intended to designate. Of the former kind
is the name of Alcyon ; of the latter, are the names
of Harpalus, Corydon, Palin, and Alcon. In like
manner, Golding was denominated Palemon, with a
particular reference to his poetical version of the

WILLIAM SUAKSPEARE.

259

fourth book of Ovid's Metamorphosis, which he
had translated and pubhshed about thirty years
before, and in which the story of Melicerta, the son of
Athamas and Ino, occurs ; who, we are there told,
after his untimely death, by his mother throwing
herself and him into the ocean, became a sea-god
under the name of Palemon. This fable, which Gold-
ing has translated with great spirit and vigour,
Spenser has again alluded to, in the eleventh canto
of the fourth book of his Faery Queen :

*' Phorcys, the father of that'fatall brood,
** By whom these old heroes wonne such fame,
" And Glaucus that wise soothsayes understood ;
" And tragicke Inoes sonne, the which became
" A god of seas, through his mad mother's blame,
Now hight Palemon, and is sayler's friend^."

The late Mr. Warton, in his excellent History of
Enghsh Poetry, has cited with just praise a large
portion of Golding's translation of this part of the
Metamorphosis, as a striking specimen of the abi-
lities of Golding as a translator, whom in this respect
he greatly prefers to Phaer and Twyne, the poetical
translators of Virgil. Doubtless the English version
of the story of Palemon, made a similar impression
on Spenser and his contemporaries ; and hence we
may reasonably presume he was induced to conceal
the translator of Ovid under this adumbration \

4 See also Faery Queen, book v. c. 8, st. 47.

5 My friend Mr. Todd, in his valuable edition of Spenser, has
also entered into an examination of Colin Clouts Come Home

S 2

260

THE LIFE OF

In the midst of these fanciful adumbrations, we
are surprised with the undisguised name of [ WilHam]
Alabaster \ a very distinguished scholar, then about

Again, with a view to ascertain, as far as conjecture can assist us,
who the persons were who were understood by the poet under the
feigned names which he has introduced. In several instances he
coincides with Mr. Malone, but in others they differ. Palin he
supposes to have been Thomas Chaloner; Alcon, Thomas
Watson ; Old Palemon, Thomas Churchyard ; and Harpalus,
Barnaby Googe. With regard to Palemon, I am inclined to
think that Mr. Todd was in the right. If indeed it could be
proved that Churchyard was the author of that ballad which is
preserved along with Surrey's poems, " Phillida was a fair maid,"
there could be little doubt that he was designated by Harpalus.
But I know not upon what authority a composition of so much
merit has been ascribed to him ; it is certainly very different from
his usual strain. I should think that he was commemorated
under the name of Palemon, because he seems himself to have
alluded to a line in that part of the poem :

*' That sung so long untill quite hoarse he gre^"
In Churchyard's Cherishing, 1596, he describes the Court as
being

The platform where all poets thrive,
" Save one "whose voice is hoarse they say."
But the main object of our present inquiry, to which the other
questions which these lines have suggested are comparatively
unimportant, is, whether Shakspeare is pointed out under the
name of Action. Mr. Todd applies it to Drayton. But there is
nothing heroical in that poet's name ; nor are " high thoughts '*
the distinguishing excellence of his poetry ; while, on the other
hand, Mr. Malone has, I think, sufficiently established the
fondness of our ancestors for such a play of words as Shake-spear
would furnish. But the reader has the evidence already before
him, and I shall not detain him longer by any observations of
my own. Boswell.
^ William Alabaster was born in Suffolk, about the year 1567.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 261

twenty-seven years of age ; whose Roxana, a Latin
tragedy, had been acted at Trinity College, in Cam-
bridge, a few years before, with great applause, and
was surreptitiously and imperfectly printed about
forty years afterwards (1632) ; which drew from the
author a genuine edition in the same year : but the
unfinished performance here so highly eulogized, his
Eliseis, a Latin poem of considerable length, in
honour of Queen Elizabeth, with all its attributed
merit, and notwithstanding the subject was once so
popular, has never been submitted to the press. It
is, however, yet extant in manuscript. Of his
English poetry, I have been able to recover but
two short specimens, preserved in the Bodleian Li-
brary, in a manuscript of Archbishop Sancroft's, which

He was educated at Trinity College, in Cambridge, where he
took the degree of Bachelor of Arts in 1587, and that of Master
of Arts in 1591 ; and in 1592 he was incorporated into the
University of Oxford. " He was," says Wood, Ath. Oxon. vol. i.
Fast. 144, ** the rarest poet and Grecian that any one age or
nation produced." About two years after this poem was written,
he accompanied Lord Essex, as one of )iis chaplains, in the ex-
pedition against Cadiz. After his return from that expedition,
he changed his religion for that of Rome, and published, in his
justification, his Seven Motives, to which two answers appeared.
Afterwards, being disgusted with his new friends, he returned to
the church of England, became a Prebendary of St. Paul's,
Rector of Thorfield, in Hertfordshire, and in 1614, Doctor of
Divinity. He died in April, 1640. His works, beside those
already mentioned, are. Apparatus in Revelationem Jesu
Christi, 4to. 1607 ; Spiraculum Tubarum, n. d. Ecce Sponsus
Venit, 4to. 1633; Lexicon Pentaglotton, fol. 1637. His Roxana,
he tells us himself, was the work of only a fortnight. Of this
distinguished scholar and poet there is an admirable print, by
Pciyne, which was well copied a few years ago.

262

THE LIFE OF

have never been printed, and which, therefore, I shall
give below In naming Alabaster thus directly,

y A New Year's Gift to my Saviour*

** Ho ! God be here. Is Christ, my Lord, at leisure ?
** Blessed S'. Peter, to my King present
** This Alabaster box which I have sent ;
" And if he ask how it may do him pleasure,
** Tell him I hear that he hath endless treasure
" But hath not vessels half sufficient,
** And in this box are many moe content,
** Wherein of grace he may bestow large measure:
" Within my spirit his knowledge he may place,
*' Light in my mind, within my will his grace :
* -x- -x- -x- *

*' Merit in memory, love in my hart :
" This if he doe, I hope by seeing it
Ten thousand may themselves likewise impart."

The transcriber of this sonnet has written, in the third line,
*• An Alahlaster box ; " a corruption so common that Sir Robert
Cecil, in one of his letters, thus writes the word. See Win-
wood's Memor. ii. 14;7.

" Upon the Ensigns of our Crucijied Saviour.

** O sweet and bitter monument of pain !

*' (Bitter to Christ, who all the pain endured.

But sweet to me whose life his death secured,)
*• How shall I full-express such loss, such gain.
'* My tongue shall be my pen ; mine eyes shall rain
*' Tears for the ink ; the Cross where I was cured
*' Shall be my book ; where having all abjured,
** And callitig heaven to record, in that place [plain]
" Thus will I plainly write — no sin like mine.
*' When I have done, do thou, Jesu divine,
*' Take up the last sponge of thy passion
" And blot that forth. Then be thy Spirit the quill,

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

263

Spenser's object, doubtless, was to recommend his
friend to the Queen's favour, and to procure him
promotion in the church, which he afterwards ob-
tained.

In hke manner, the poet next mentioned is not
concealed under the cloud of description, or the mys-
terious perplexity of a fictitious name ; but we are
plainly told, that [Samuel] Daniel, a new poet ^,

" Thy blood the ink, and with compassion
** Write thus upon my soul — thy Jesu still''

The piety of these sonnets is more obvious than the poetry ;
yet Donne, and those in that age who admired Donne, doubtless
thought them excellent. I have preserved them as the only
English specimens of Alabaster's writing that I have been able to
discover. In the first of these sonnets, it is manifest, from its
structure, that a line has been omitted, by the negligence of the
transcriber, which rhymed with the word it ; and in the eighth
line of the second, the word p/ace was evidently written carelessly,
instead oi plain ^ or some other word of a similar termination. In
the corresponding sonnet, the first, fourth, fifth, and eighth lines
rhyme to each other.

In the former sonnet, the allusion to the name of the writer is
an additional confirmation of what has been said on the propensity
of that age to '* a dalliance with names."

^ Samuel Daniel was born in Somersetshire, in 1562, and
educated at Magdalen-College, in Oxford, where he studied
about five years. In 1585, he first became known to the public
by translating a tract of Paulus Jovius, on Impresses. But he
did not commence poet till 1592, when his sonnets, which are
here referred to, and his Complaint of Rosamond, were pub-
lished in quarto. When the present eulogy was written, he was
about thirty-two years old. He died in 1619.

How very highly Daniel was estimated in his own time, and
surely considerably above his deserts (though he was not wholly
devoid of merit), may be learned from the high eulogies which

264 THE LIFE OF

(whose sonnets to his " scornful " mistress, DeHa,
appeared in 1592,) had surpassed all his predecessors,
and was equal to the most arduous poetical attempts.

The Shepherd of the Ocean, by other parts of this
poem, is ascertained to have been Sir Walter Ralegh ^

his poetry extorted from others, as well as from Spenser. " As
Parthenius Nicaeus (says Meres) excellently sung the praises of
his Arete, so Daniel hath divinelj/ soneted the matchlesse beauty
of his Delia." Wit's Treasury, 8vo. 1598, p. 280. In one of the
miscellanies of that era, of which I have neglected to set down the
title, is a paper of verses, addressed to Mr. Samuel Daniel,
Prince of English Poets.

9 In Colin Clout, Spenser thus describes Ralegh's visit to him :

** One day, quoth he [Colin], I sat as was my trade,
" Under the foot of Mole, that mountain hore,

" Keeping my sheep amongst the cooly shade
" Of the greene alders by the Mullaes shore.

" There a straunge shepheard chaunced to find me out,
" Whether allured with my pipe's delight,

** Whose pleasing sound yshrilled far about,
" Or thither led by chaunce, I know not right :

'* Whom when I asked from what place he came,
" And how he hight, him selfe he did yclepe,

" The Shepheard of the Ocean by name,

" And said he came far from the main sea deepe.

" He sitting me beside in that same shade,
^ ** Provoked me to plaie some pleasant fit,
** And when he heard the musick which I made,
** He found him selfe full-greatly pleased at it.

** Yet aemuling my pipe, he took in hand
" My pipe before that aemuled of many,
" And plaid thereon, for well that skill he cond,
Ilim-selfe as skilfull in that art as any,"

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 265

at this time in disgrace with the Queen, for having
seduced Elizabeth Throckmorton ^ one of her maids
of honour ; though he had made the best reparation
in his power, by marrying that lady. He had some
years before written a poem entitled Cynthia, ex-
pressly in honour of Elizabeth, of which, having in
vain sought for it in many ancient manuscript col-
lections, I fear no copy has been preserved; but
Spenser, in the present passage, seems rather to have
had in contemplation some passionate poetical effu-
sions of Ralegh, who was now endeavouring to
regain the Queen's favour ; and, affecting a kind of
romantic love for her Majesty, pretended that, while
she frowned on him, and excluded him from her pre-
sence, life was not worth enjoying.

By Amyntas, the next person introduced, at once
a poet himself, and a patron of poets, we may pro-
nounce with certainty, was meant one of the most
accomplished noblemen of his time, Ferdinand, the
fifth Earl of Derby, and the husband of Alice
Spenser, afterwards mentioned under the name of
Amarillis ^ whom he married in or before the year

» The various circumstances of Ralegh's life are so generally-
known, that it is not necessary to give here even an abridgment
of them. I shall, therefore, confine myself to his actions in Ire-
land, his connexion with Spenser, his marriage with Elizabeth
Throckmorton and his subsequent disgrace, and his poetical pro-
ductions ; particulars connected in some measure with the verses
before us, and concerning which the information supplied by his
biographers is so imperfect and erroneous, that to state them truly
will require a disquisition too long for this place. See the Ap-
pendix.

^ Alice, the sixth daughter of Sir John Spenser, knight, was

266

THE LIFE OF

1583. The high eulogy on Amyntas, which is found
in the conclusion of one of Nashe's tracts ^, was un-
married to Ferdinand Lord Strange, some time before Dec. 1583.
(Peck's Desid. Curios, vol. i. p. 116, 4to.) Six years after her
husband's death she married (Oct. 21, 1600) Sir Thomas Egerton,
then lord keeper of the great seal. Before this lady, in 1633,
Milton's Masque was originally presented at Hatfield, by the
grandchildren of her second husband. Harrington, as Mr. Warton
has observed, has an epigram highly in her praise, book iii. ep. 47.
She died Jan. 26, 1635-6. Her sister Elisabeth, whom Spenser
has distinguished by the name of Phillis, was the second daughter
of Sir John Spenser, and the wife of Sir George Carey, eldest son
of Henry Lord Hunsdon. Spenser's Charillis, was Anne, the
fifth daughter of the same person, who had first married William
Stanley, Lord Monteagle, and secondly, Henry, Lord Compton,
and was at this time the second wife of Robert Sackville, eldest
son of Thomas, Lord Buckhurst. In the group of court ladies
afterwards introduced in this poem, they are thus described :

" Ne less praiseworthy are the sisters three,

** The honour of the noble family,
" Of which I meanest boast my selfe to be,

" And most that unto them I am so nigh ;

" Phillis, Charillis, and sweet Amarillis :

** Phillis the fair, is eldest of the three ;
** The next to her is beautiful Charillis ;

" But the youngest is the highest in degree."

After having expatiated in the praise of Phyllis and Charillis,
with whom we are less concerned, the poet adds —

** But Amaryllis, whether fortunate,

" Or else unfortunate, may I aread,
*' That freed is from Cupid's yoke by fate,

" Since which she doth new bonds adventure dread.

" Shepherd, whatever thou hast heard to be

*' In this or that prays 'd diversely apart,
*' In her thou mayst them all assembled see,

" And seald up in the treasure of her heart."

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

267

doubtedly addressed to the same nobleman, who is
represented as the second mystical argument of Spen-

In his Dedication of The Tears of the Muses to this lady, under
the title of Lady Strange, he speaks of her and her lord with no
less admiration and respect : ** Most brave and noble Ladie ;
The things that make ye so much honored of the world as ye
bee, are such as without my simple lines' testimonie are throughlie
known to all men ; namely, your excellent beautie, your virtuous
behaviour, and your noble match with that most honorable lord,
the verie pattern of right nobilitie. But the causes of which you
have deserved of me to be honored, if honour it be at all, are
both your particular bounties, and also some private bands of
affinitie."

3 This passage, which has hitherto, I believe, escaped notice,
affords so strong a confirmation of Spenser's eulogy on Ferdinand,
Earl of Derby, that I shall transcribe it entire. It is found near
the conclusion of Nashe's popular tracts entitled Pierce Pennilesse
his Supplication to the Divell, of which the first edition appeared
in the autumn of 1592 :

" But from generall fame, let me digres to my private expe-
rience, and with a tongue unworthie to name a name of such
worthines, affectionately emblazon to the eyes that wonder, the
matchless image of honour, and magnijicent rexioarder of vertue^
Jove's eagle-borne Ganimed, thrise noble Amintas : in whose
high spirit such a deitie of wisdome appereth, that if Homer
were to write his Odyssea new (where under the person of
Ulysses he describeth a singular man of perfection, in whome all
ornaments both of peace and war are assembled in the height of
their excellence) he need no other instance to augment his con-
ceipt, than the rare carriage of his honorable minde. Many
writers and good wits are given to commend their patrons and
benefactors, some for prowessCj some for policie, others for the
glorie of their ancestrie and exceeding bountie and Hberalitie ;
but if my unable pen should ever enterprise such a continuate
taske of praise, I woulde embowell a number of these wind-puft
bladders, and disfurnish their bald pates, of the periwigs poets have
lent them ; that so I might restore glorie to his right inheritance,
and these stolen titles to their true owners : which, if it would so

268

THE LIFE OF

ser's Redcrosse Knight. Lord Derby perhaps acquired
the name given him in the verses under our consi-

fall out (as time maie worke all things), the aspiring nettles
with their shady toppes shall no longer over-dreep the best
hearbs, or keep them from the smiling aspect of the Sunn, that
live and shine by his comfortable beames : none but Desert should
sit in Fame's grace: none but Hector be remembered in the
chronicles of prowesse, none but thou, most courteous Amyntas,
be the second mystical argument of the Knight of the Red CrossC'
O decus atque sevi gloria summa tui !
And heere, heavenly Spencer, I am most highlie to acuse
thee of forgetfulnes, that in that honorable catalogue of our
English heroes, which insueth the conclusion of thy famous
Fairie Queene, thou wouldest let so special a piller of nobilitie
passe unsaluted. The verie thought of his farre-derived de^
scent, and extraordinarie parts, wherewith he astonieth the ivorld,
and dratos all hearts to his love, would have inspired thy fore-
wearied Muse, with new furie to proceed, to the next triumphs of
thy statelie Goddesse ; but I, in favour of so rare a scholler,
suppose with this counsell he refrained his mention in this first
part, that he might with full saile proceede to his due commen-
dation in the second. Of this occasion long since I happened to
frame a sonnet, which being wholie intended to the reverence of
this renotvmed lord (to whom I owe all the utmost powers of my
love and dutie), I meane here, for varietie of stile to insert :

" Perusing yesterday with idle eyes

*' The Fairie Singers statelie tuned verse,
*• And viewing, after chapmen's wonted guise

" What strange contents the title did rehearse ;
** I streight leapt over to the latter end,

*' Where, like the queint comedians of our time,
** That when their play is doone, do fall to ryme,

*' I found short lines to sundrie nobles pend ;
** Whom he as speciall mirrours singled fourth,

'* To be the patrons of his poetry :
" I read them all, and reverenc't their worth ;

'* Yet wondred he left out thy memory :

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 269

deration, either from his having written an original
poem, of which Amyntas was the principal personage \
or from his having heen thus denominated in some
verses written expressly in his praise \ or from his

" But therefore gest I, he supprest thy name,

** Because few words might not compose thy fame.'*

'* Beare with me, gentle poet, though I conceive not aright of
thy purpose, or be too inquisitive into the intent of thy oblivion :
for, however my conjecture may miss the cushion, yet shall my
speech savour of friendship, though it be not alied to judgement."

It is observable that Lord Derby is here denominated the se-
cond mystical argument of Spenser's Red Cross Knight, as Sir
Philip Sidney was undoubtedly intended to be shadowed in his
Arthur. All the Knights of the Faery Queen, it is well known,
had their original in the Court of Elizabeth.

Mr. Upton supposed that Amintas, mentioned by Spenser in
his Faery Queen, book iii. c. vi. st. 4?5, was also the Earl of Derby ;
but undoubtedly he was mistaken. The Amintas there alluded
to, " to whom sweet poet's verse hath given endless date," is the
poetical Amintas of Watson, who, according to him, was turned
into an Amaranth ; and the two poets there complimented were
Watson and Fraunce. See p. 253, note f.

* Gabriel Harvey, in a manuscript which will be quoted here-
after, joins the poem of Amyntas with Astrophel. The piece
which he has there alluded to, should seem, therefore, to have
been an English composition, and perhaps was written by Lord
Derby.

5 That Spenser sometimes in this manner shadowed real per-
sons under poetical names given them by others, appears from a
passage in his Ruins of Time, 1591 :

** Therefore in this 'halfe happie do I read

" Good Melibae, that hath a poet got
** To sing his living praises, being dead,

*' Deserving never here to be forgot.'*

Melibae was here intended to designate Sir Francis Walsing-

270

THE LIFE OF

having translated either Tasso's Pastoral (Aminta)>
or Thomas Watson's " sugred Amyntas," as it is
called by a writer of that age ; an admired Latin
poem, published in 1585 ^.

This nobleman had long in his service a company
of comedians, who were known by the appellation of
the servants of the Lord Strange (the title which he
bore till within a few months of his death), and who

singham ; and Spenser thus denominates him, in consequence of
Thomas Watson having published in the preceding year a Latin
elegiack poem in honour of his memory, entitled Melibseus. — So,
Thestylis, whom he has introduced as a shepherd in Colin Clout,
was certainly meant to represent his friend, Lodowick Bryskett,
who, a few years before, had written an elegy on the death of
Sir Philip Sidney, under the title of The Mourning Muse of
Thestylis."

^ It is highly praised by Nashe in his Epistle prefixed to
Green's Arcadia, 1589. Thispoera, which is in 8vo. contains the
complaints of Amintas for eleven days after the death of Phillis,
and is divided into eleven sections, each of which is entitled
Querela (Prima, Secunda, &c.) On the eleventh day Amintas
dies. The only copy of this very rare piece that I have seen, is
in the British Museum. In 1587, Abraham Fraunce published a
translation of it, with the following title : " The Lamentation of
Amyntas for the Death of Phillis, paraph rastically translated out
of Latineinto English hexameters." He also published in 1591,
" The Countess of Pembroke's Ivy Church, containing the affec-
tionate Life, and unfortunate Death of Phillis and Amyntas, that
in a pastorall, this in a funeral ; both in English hexameters."
** An ould facioned love translated from Watson's Amintas/' by
J. T. was published in 4to. in 1594-. Watson's Latin poem, en-
titled Amintae Gaudia, was a posthumous production (4to. 1592),
and is not the *' sugred Amyntas," praised by Nashe. Watson
also wrote some English verses, entitled '* Amintas [lamenting]
for the Death of his Phillis," which are preserved in England's
Helicon, 4.to. 1600.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 271

appear to have been held in considerable estimation ;
being for many years employed to act before the
Queen, during the festivity of Christmas^. In this
company the celebrated actor Edward AUeyn, was
the principal performer. The very high praise given
to Lord Derby, both by Spenser and Nashe, might
incline us to regret the loss of the greater part of his
poetical compositions, had not one of his poems, con-
sisting of more than a hundred lines, been preserved \
which affords abundant proof that the virtues and
accomplishments of this " perfect pattern of right
nobilitie," aided by the respect belonging to his high
birth, by his union with a lady to whom Spenser was
related, and perhaps by personal obligation ^ induced
him to view this nobleman's poetry with a very fa-
vourable eye. Had his judgment not been influenced
by this friendly partiality, either Richard Sackville,
Lord Buckhurst, or Edward, Earl of Oxford ^ whose

7 See the History of the English Stage, in vol. iii. After the
death of Ferdinand, Earl of Derby, in 1594', the troop of come-
dians that had been patronized by him, became the servants of
the Lord Admiral, Charles, Earl of Nottingham.

^ This poem is preserved in The Antiquarian Repertory, vol. iii.
p. 133. It was printed from a manuscript volume belonging to
Sir John Hawkins, which perished in the fire that consumed his
house in Queen Square, in the year 1788. The heroine of this
poem is Phillis, but her lover's name is not mentioned. Some
of his poetry is preserved in a collection entitled " Belvidere,
or the Garden of the Muses," as the editor informs us in his pre-
face ; but the verses in that work being printed without appro-
priation to their author, we know not which are Lord Derby's.

9 See the Dedication of The Tears of the Muses, quoted
ante, p, 265, n. 2.

* !t is highly probable, that in the selection of some of the poets

272

THE LIFE OF

poetry has much more vigour and elegance than that
of Lord Derhy, would, perhaps, have heen here sub-
stituted in his room. But the kindness and grati-
tude of our poet could find no defect in the poetical
effusions of Stanley, Ralegh, Sidney, or his sister,
Mary, Countess of Pembroke. In all other respects,
however. Lord Derby strictly merited the high eu-
logy with which he has been honoured. Some of
his letters have come down to us, which are written
with perspicuity and spirit ; and perhaps some more
both of his poetry and prose may yet be extant in
manuscript, or miscellaneous printed collections, er-
roneously attributed to others. But his career of lite-

here enumerated and eulogized, Spenser was governed in some
degree by personal kindness. The principal poets whom he has
omitted, comprising them under the general words — " All these,
and many others moe^ remaine," &c. were. The Earl of Oxford,
Lord Buckhurst, Sir Edward Dyer, Sir John Harrington, William
Warner, Henry Constable, Sir John Davys, Michael Drayton,
Matthew Roydon, Joshua Sylvester, and George Chapman. —
Watson, Turberville, Marlowe, and Greene, were at this time dead,
and therefore could not, according to his scheme, be introduced.

* See Lodge's Illustrations of British History, iii. 37. The
disagreement between Lord Essex and Lord Derby, which gave
rise to the Letters printed by Mr. Lodge, is referred to by Sir
John Harrington, Nugae Antiquae, vol. i. p. 114, edit. 1804.

Other letters written by this gentleman are preserved in Peck's
Desid. Curios, vol. i. p. 115, 141.

Ferdinand, Earl of Derby, was educated at College, in Cam-
bridge, and was created Master of Arts at Oxford in Sept. 1589,
together with Sir George Carew, and Sir John Spenser of Althorp.
Wood's Ath. Oxon. i. Fast. 138.

Chapman, in an Epistle to his friend Matthew Roydon, pre-
fixed to his poem entitled The Shadow of Night, published in
1594, thus highly commends this nobleman :

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 273

rary and honourable exertions lasted not long ; for
a short while before these verses were written, this
amiable and much respected nobleman died at the
age of thirty-seven, in extreme agony, having been
poisoned, as there are the strongest grounds for be-
lieving, by one of his own servants ^.

But where, it may be asked, among all these dis-
tinguished votaries of the Muses, is Shakspeare
found ? — He closes the poetical band, obscurely, yet
unquestionably shadowed in these lines :

" And then, though last, not least, is Action, —
" A gentler shepheard may no where be found ;

" Whose Muse, full of high thoughts' invention*,
** Doth, like himself, heroically sound"

" But I stay this spleen, when I remember, my good Mat. how
joyfully oftentimes you reported unto me, that most ingenious
Darbie, deepe-searching Northumberland [Henry, the ninth Earl]
and skill-imbracing heire of Hunsdon [George, afterwards the
second Lord Hunsdon] had most profitably entertained learning in
themselves, to the vital warmth of freezing science, and to the
admirable luster of their true nobilitie."

3 Camden, Hist. Eliz. vol. iii. p. 685, edit. Hearne ; and
Collins's Peerage, under the title of Derby. Sir John Harrington
also alludes to " the hastened fate " of Ferdinand Earl of Derby,
whom he styles ** one of England's greatest peers." Epig.
book iii. ep. 47. His portrait is yet preserved at the ancient
seat of this noble family in Lancashire.

+ We find a similar eulogy in Spenser's verses addressed to his
admired friend Ralegh, at the end of his third book of his Faery
Queene, 4to. 1590:

*' To thee that art the summers nightingale

Thy soveraigne goddesses most deare delight,
" Why do I send this rustick madrigale

*' That may thy tunefuU eare unseason quite ?
" Then only fit this argument to write,
** In whose high thoughts Pleasure hath built her boure."
VOL. II. T

274 THE LIFE OF

None of the poetical denominations in this list,
we have already seen, were adopted capriciously, or
are without meaning. In forming the name by
which our great poet is here designated, as in some
others introduced in his Faery Queen ^, and else-
where, the author is indebted to the Greek language,
in the study of which he took great delight ^, the
word perhaps signifying only what in the preceding
part of the line had been said in plainer terms';
or he may have formed this denomination with a re-
ference to the cause or origin of our poet's surname,
to which in the following lines he more openly al-
ludes ^. It may be conjectured that before this poem
was written, Shakspeare had produced on the stage
one or more of his historical plays, probably King
Richard the Second and Third. Spenser, therefore,

5 Thus we have Aerates, Panope, Melissa, Philotime, Timias,
Archimago, Eudoxus, and others of a similar formation.

In like manner. Sir Philip Sidney, in consequence of his passion
for Stella, was denominated Astrophil, which, from some fancy,
Spenser always wrote Astrophel or Astrqfell^ but which, con-
formably to the etymology, ought certainly to be written
Astrophil, as Matthew Roydon has written it in his Elegy on
Sidney. See Appendix.

* A translation of Axiocha's Dialogues, attributed to Plato, by
Spenser, was, I believe, published in 1592.

7 From a priv. and H^:SnN or HTinN or HTTON, infe-
rior. Perhaps indeed he might have meant that our poet was
inferior to none. So, in his Faery Queen, b. iii. c. iii. st. 54:

■ in that royal hous,

'* From whence, to none inferior^ ye came."

8 From a<Tiov, causa : so we have in Latin, iEtiologia, derived in
part from the same Greek root. My former conjecture, however,
appears to me the more probable of the two.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 275

while he distinguished him hy that characteristick epi-
thet which several of his contemporaries have applied
to him, — "A gentler shepherd may no where be
found," and alluded to the brandished spear from
which his name, so congenial with heroick song,
was originally derived ^ may be supposed to have had
in contemplation these imperial tragedies, then per-
haps performing with applause at the Curtain Theatre,
as well as his Venus and Adonis, and ^ the newly
published poem of the Rape of Lucrece, which had
appeared in the middle of the year 1594, and may,

9 Fuller, as well as Spenser, alludes to the heroick sound of
our poet's name. " In Shakespeare," says he (Worthies, Warw.
p. 126), ** three eminent poets may seem in some sort to be
compounded. 1. Martial; in the warlike sound of his surname,
whence some may conjecture him of a military extraction, hasti-
vibranSf or Shakespeare."

Ben Jonson, in his posthumous verses on our author, has a
similar allusion to Shakspeare's name :

«« . Look how the father's face

" Lives in his issue ; even so the grace
" Of Shakspeare's mind and manners brightly shines
" In his well-torned and true filed lines ;
" In each of which he seems to shake a lance,
" As brandished at the eyes of ignorance."
See also Bancroft's Epigrams, 4to. 1639, signat. D 2, where
our poet is thus addressed :

" Thou hast so used thy pen, or shook thy speare,
" That poets startle, not thy wit come near."
In a description of two knights tilting, in Spenser's Faery
Queen, b. iii. c. i. st. 7, we find the component parts of our
poet's name thus heroically introduced :

" Great shame and sorrow of that fall he tooke,
*• For never yet, sith warlike armes he bore
" And shivering speare in bloody field first shook.
He found him selfe dishonored so sore."
T 2

.THE LIFE OF

with perfect propriety, be referred to under the deno-
mination of heroick verse. In Richard the Second,
the challenge of Bolingbroke and the Duke of Nor-
folk in the first act, and the contention in the fourth
act between the various noble disputants assembled
in the lists at Coventry, being conducted with all the
forms and pomp of chivalry, furnished, doubtless, a
very splendid spectacle ; and indeed the whole drama^
as well as that of Richard the Third, doth, like its
author, " keroicalli^ sounds*

Let it not, however, be supposed, that Shakspeare
was lightly estimated by Spenser, because his name
is last introduced in this list of poetical worthies ; for,
not to insist on the law of heraldry, by which, in all
processions, the last place is considered the most ho-
nourable, and always assigned to the person of the
greatest dignity, we may observe that Nashe, in an
eulogy on his friend George Peele, whom he pre-
ferred to all the dramatic writers of the period when
it was written (1589), introduces his admired and
favourite poet precisely in the same manner, though
certainly he intended to represent him as far sur-
passing all his contemporaries : " And for the last^
though not the least of them all ^ I dare commend

^ See also Nashe's Have With You to Saffron Walden, 4to.
1596, Signat. R. ** Doctors Dove and Clarencius I turne loose

to bee their owne arbitrators and advocates, as also in like

sort, Master Spencer, xjohom I do not thrust into the lowest place,
because I make the lowest valuation of, but as we use to sett the
sumtn' tot* underneath or at the bottom, he being the tof
of whatsoever can be said ofsharpe invention and schoUership."

" Though last, not least," seems to have been a common
formula in that age ; and is always applied to a person very highly
valued by the speaker. " Next like an ale-house ruffen, with

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 277

him [Peele] unto all that know him, as the chief
supporter of pkasaunce, now living, the Atlas of

his dagger he slew the infortunate good King Henry the Sixt in
the Tower of London. Then heaping murder upon murder, he
caused George Duke of Clarence, his natural brother, to be
drowned in a butte of malmsey ; and last, though not the least,
to rowle up a number of noble subjectes, ends with the death of
Edward the Fift, and Richard Duke of Yorke,'* &c.

Again, in the Remembraunce of the woorthie and well imployed
Life of the Right Honourable Sir Nicholas Bacon, &c. by the
same author, 4to. [1578] :

The last, but not of worldly evils the least,
*' When we have fed of vaine delights our fill,
" Death comes in fine —
So, in Kyd's Spanish Tragedy :

" The third and last, not least in our account."
Again, in his Cornelia, 1594?:

" And last, not least, bereft of my best father."
Again, in Sylvester's Dubartas, 4to. 1605, p. 185 :
** Thou last, not least, brave eagle, no contempt
*' Made me so long thy storie hence exempt."
Again, in the old anonymous play, entitled The History of
King Leir, 4to. 1605 :

" to thee last of all,

" Not greeted last, 'cause thy desert is small.'*
Again, in A Woman Will Have her Will, a comedy by William
Houghton, acted in 1598 :

** Last, yet as great in love, as to the Jirst,
" If you remember," &c.
So, also, our author in his King Lear, 4to. 1608 :

" But now, our Joy,

** Although the last, not least in our dear love."
Again, in his Julius Caesar :

** Though lasty not least in love, yours, good Trebonius."
Again, in Puttenham's Arte of Poesie, 1589 : " But lest in
recitall and^rs^ in degree, the Queen our sovereign ladie, whose
learned, delicate, noble muse, easilie surmounteth all the rest
that have written before her time or since, for sense, sweetnesse.

278 THE LIFE OF

poetry, and primus *verborum artifex ; whose first
increase [production]. The Arraignment of Paris,
might plead to your opinions his pregnant dexteritie
of wit, and manifold variety of invention, wherein,
me judice^ he goeth a step beyond all that write
Such having been the usage and phraseology of the
time, no inference can be drawn to the disadvantage
of Shakspeare, from the last place being allotted to
him in this poetical catalogue ; which Spenser may
have been induced to assign him from his having
been the last of the whole band, whose muse had so-
licited the publick favour. Churchyard and Geld-
ing preceded him many years. Gorges, Peele, Lodge,
Alabaster, Ralegh, and Lord Derby, had written
between 1580 and 1590, and Daniel in 1592.
Shakspeare's two poems did not appear till after-
wards, the one in 1593, the other in 1594 ; and the
historical tragedies already mentioned, it is highly
probable, were then also first produced. In like
manner, our poet's Cordelia, though, as the youngest
daughter, last interrogated concerning her filial af-

and subtilltie, be it in ode, elegie, epigram, or any other kind of
poeme, heroick or lyricke, wherein it shall please Her Majestic
to employ her penne, even by so much oddes as her owne excel-
lent estate and degree exceedeth all the rest of her most humble
vassals." — [Here we find that Spenser*s Eulogy on Her Majesty's
poetrt/f extravagant as it is, was only the common language of
that time.]

Thus also Webster (though the last, not the least apposite
authority) in the preface to his White Devil, 1612: *' — and
lasili/f •without ivronglast to be named, the right happy and copious
Industrie of Master Shake-spcare," &c.

^ Epistle prefixed to Greene's Arcadia, 4to. 1589.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

279

fection, was unquestionably her fond father's " joy,"
and more beloved by him than either of her sisters,
who, solely on account of their seniority, had been
previously addressed.

For this long, but, I trust not wholly uninterest-
ing, disquisition, no apology is necessary. Every
poetical reader, I am confident, will be gratified by
an endeavour to " pluck out the heart of this
mystery," to penetrate the thick " veil of words,"
under which, for more than two centuries, the cha-
racters and productions of so many ingenious men
have been concealed ; and will feel no less satisfac-
tion than I .have done, on discovering, that, though
Shakspeare was not the comick writer eulogized by
the author of The Tears of the Muses, at a time
when his name was scarcely known in the world, he
yet, afterwards, was duly appreciated by his illus-
trious and amiable contemporary ; who, in talents and
virtues, more nearly resembled Shakspeare than did
any writer of that age ; and who, we find, at a very
early period of our great poet's dramatick life, had
a high and just sense of his transcendent merits.

SECTION XIV.

Before we proceed to consider Shakspeare in his
higher character of a poet, let us advert to those
scanty portions of information which have come down
to us respecting his merits as an actor, a very infe-
rior capacity certainly, but naturally connected with
his dramatick career. Upon this point I have again
to quote the authority of My. Aubrey, whose words
arc these:

Being inclined naturally (says Mr. Aubrey) to

280

THE LIFE Of'

poetry and acting, he came to London, I guesse about
eighteen, and was an actor at one of the playhouses,
and did act exceedingly well. Now Ben Jonson
never was a good actor, but an excellent instructor.'*
The first observation that I shall make on this
account is, that the latter part of it, which informs us
that Ben Jonson was a bad actor, is incontestably con-
firmed by one of the comedies of Decker ; and there-
fore, though there were no other evidence, it might be
plausibly inferred that Mr. Aubrey's information con-
cerning our poet's powers on the stage was not less
accurate. But in this instance I am not under the
necessity of resting on such an inference ; for I am
able to produce the testimony of a contemporary in
support of Shakspeare's histrionick merit. In the
preface to a pamphlet entitled Kinde-Hartes Dreame,
published in December 1592, which I have elsewhere
had occasion to quote for another purpose, the
author, Henry Chettle, who was himself a dra-
matick writer, and well acquainted with the principal
poets and players of the time, thus speaks of Shak-
speare:

" The other ^, whom at that time I did not so
much spare, as since I wish I had, for that as I have
moderated the hate of living writers, and might have
used my own discretion, (especially in such a case, the
author [Robert Greene] being dead,) I am as sorry
as if the original fault had been my fault ; because
my selfe have seen his demeanour no less civil than
he EXCELLENT in the qualitie he professes, be-
sides, divers of worship have reported his upright-

3 That by the words '* The other,'' was meant Shakspeare,
will be shewn in the Essay on the Order of his plays.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

281

ness of dealing, which argues his honestie, and his
facetious grace in writing, that approves his art."

To those who are not conversant with the language
of our old writers, it may be proper to observe, that
the words, " the quality he professes," particularly
denote his profession as an actor. The latter part
of the paragraph indeed, in which he is praised as a
good man and an elegant writer, shews this : how-
ever, the following passage in Stephen Gosson's
Schoole of Abuse, 1579, in which the very same words
occur, will put this matter beyond a doubt. " Over-
lashing in apparell (says Gosson) is so common
a fault, that the verye hyerlings of some of our
plaiers, which stand at the reversion of vi^. by the
weeke, jet under gentlemen's noses in sutes of silke,
exercising themselves in prating on the stage, and
common scoffing when they come abrode ; where they
looke askance at every man of whom the sonday be-
fore they begged an almes. I speak not this as
though every one that professeth the qualitie, so
abused him selfe ; for it is wel knowen, that some of
them are sober, discreet, properly learned, honest
householders, and citizens well thought on amonge
their neighbours at home, though the pride of their
shadowes (I meane those hange-byes whome they
succour with stipend) cause them to bee somewhat
talked of abrode

Thus early was Shakspeare celebrated as an actor,
and thus unfounded was the information which Mr.

*> In tlie margin this cautious puritan adds — ** Some players
modest, if I he not deceived,''

282

THE LIFE OF

Rowe obtained on this subject. Wright, a more di-
ligent inquirer, and who had better opportunities of
gaining theatrical intelligence, had said about ten
years before, that he had " heard our author was a
better poet than an actor ; " but this description,
though probably true, may still leave him a consider-
able portion of merit in the latter capacity : for if the
various powers and peculiar excellencies of all the
actors from his time to the present, were united in one
man, it may well be doubted, whether they would con-
stitute a performer whose merit should entitle him to
" bench by the side " of Shakspeare as a poet.

A passage indeed in Lodge's Incarnate Devills of
the Age, 1596, has been pointed out, as levelled at
our poet's performance of the Ghost in Hamlet. But
this in my apprehension is a mistake. The ridicule in-
tended to be conveyed by the passage in question was,
I have no doubt, aimed at the actor who performed
the part of the Ghost in some miserable play which
was produced before Shakspeare commenced either
actor or writer. That such a play once existed, I
shall afterwards shew to be highly probable ; and the
tradition transmitted by Betterton, that our poet's
performance of the Ghost in his own Hamlet was his
chef-d cewore^ adds support to my opinion.

That Shakspeare had a perfect knowledge of his
art, is proved by the instructions which are given to
the player in Hamlet, and by other passages in his
works ; which, in addition to what I have already
stated, incline me to think that the traditional ac-
count transmitted by Mr. Rowe, relative to his powers
on the stage, has been too hastily credited. In the

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 283

celebrated scene between Hamlet and his mother, she
thus addresses him :

— Alas, how is't with you ?
*• That you do bend your eye on vacancy,
*• And with the incorporal air do hold discourse?
** Forth at your eyes your spirits wildly peep ;

And, as the sleeping soldiers in the alarm,
*' Your bedded hair, like life in excrements,
** Starts up, and stands on end. — Whereon do you look ?

Ham. On him ! on him ! look you, how pale he glares !
** His form and cause conjoin'd, preaching to stones,
" Would make them capable. Do not look upon me,

Lest with this piteous action, you convert
" My stern effects : then what I have to do
" Will want true colour ; tears perchance for blood."

Can it be imagined that he would have attributed
these lines to Hamlet, unless he was confident that
in his own part he could give efficacy to that piteous
action of the Ghost, which he has so forcibly de-
scribed ? or that the preceding lines spoken by the
Queen, and the description of a tragedian in King
Richard IIL could have come from the pen of an or-
dinary actor ?

" Rich. Come, cousin, can'st thou quake and change thy
colour ?

*' Murther thy breath in middle of a word ?

** And then again begin, and stop again,

** As if thou wert distraught, and mad with terror ?

Buck. Tut, I can counterfeit the deep tragedian;
" Speak, and look big, and pry on every side,
*^ Tremble and start at wagging of a straw,
" Intending deep suspicion : ghastly looks

Are at my service, like enforced smiles ;

And both are ready in their offices,
** At any time, to grac^ my stratagems."

284

THE LIFE OF

I do not, however, believe, that our poet played
parts of the first rate, though he probably distin-
guished himself by whatever he performed. If the
names of the actors prefixed to Every Man in his
Humour were arranged in the same order as the per-
sons of the dram^a, he must have represented Old
Knowell ; and if we may give credit to an anecdote
relcited in a former page, he was the Adam in his own
As You Like It. Perhaps he excelled in representing
old men. The following contemptible lines written
by a contemporary, about the year 1611, might lead
us to suppose that he also acted Duncan in Macbeth,
and the parts of King Henry the Fourth, and King
Henry the Sixth :

To our English Terence, Mr. William Shakespeare.

** Some say, good Will, which I in sport do sing,

^* Hadst thou not play'd some kingly parts in sport,
*' Thou hadst been a companion for a king,

** And been a king among the meaner sort.
" Some others raile, but raile as they think fit,
** Thou hast no railing but a raigning wit :
** And honesty thou sow'st, which they do reape,
" So to increase their stock, which they do keepe."

The Scourge of Folly, by John Davies, of Here-
ford, no date.

Another traditionary anecdote, relating to our au-
thor's dramatic performances, is thus recorded in the
MSS. of Mr. Oldys.

" One of Shakspeare's younger brothers, who
lived to a good old age, even some years, as I com-
pute, after the restoration of King Charles II. would
in his younger days come to London to visit his
brother Will^ as he called him, and be a spectator of

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 285

him as an actor in some of his own plays. This
custom, as his brother's fame enlarged, and his dra-
matick entertainments grew the greatest support of
our principal, if not of all our theatres, he continued,
it seems, so long after his brother's death, as even to
the latter end of his own life. The curiosity at this
time of the most noted actors [exciting them] to learn
something from him of his brother, &c. they justly
held him in the highest veneration. And it may be
well believed, as there was besides a kinsman and
descendant of the family, who was then a celebrated
actor among them, [Charles Hart ^. See Shakspeare's
Will.] this opportunity made them greedily inqui-
sitive into every little circumstance, more especially
in his dramatick character, which his brother could
relate of him. But he, it seems, was so stricken in
years, and possibly his memory so weakened with
infirmities, (which might make him the easier pass
for a man of weak intellects), that he could give them
but little light into their enquiries ; and all that
could be recollected from him of his brother Will,
in that station was, the faint, general, and almost
lost ideas he had of having once seen him act a part in
one of his own comedies, wherein being to personate a

5 ^Charles Hart.] Mr. Charles Hart the player was born, I
believe, about the year 1630, and died in or about 1682. If he
was a grandson of Shakspeare's sister, he was probably the son
of Michael Hart, her youngest son, of whose marriage or death
there is no account in the parish register of Stratford, and
therefore I suspect he settled in London.

[Charles Hart died in August, 1683, and was buried at Stan-
more the 20th of that month. Li/sons's Environs of London^
vol. iii. p. 400. Reed.]

286

THE LIFE OF

decrepit old man, he wore a long beard, and appeared
so weak and drooping and unable to walk, that he
was forced to be supported and carried by another
person to a table, at which he was seated among some
company, who were eating, and one of them sung a
song." See the character of Adam, in As You Like
It, Act II. Sc. ult.

Mr. Oldys seems to have studied the art of " mar-
ring a plain tale in the telling of it ; " for he has in
this story introduced circumstances which tend to
diminish, instead of adding to, its credibility. Male
dum recitas, incipit esse tuus. From Shakspeare's
not taking notice of any of his brothers or sisters in
his will, except Joan Hart, I think it highly probable
that they were all dead in 1616, except her, at least
all those of the whole blood ; though in the register
there is no entry of the burial of his brother Gilbert,
antecedent to the death of Shakspeare, or at any
subsequent period ; but we know that he survived
his brother Edmund.

The truth is, that this account of our poet's having
performed the part of an old man in one of his own
comedies, came originally from Mr. Thomas Jones, of
Tarbick, in Worcestershire, who has been already
mentioned (see p. 138), and who related it from
the information, not of one of Shakspeare's brothers,
but of a relation of our poet, who lived to a good
old age, and who had seen him act in his youth. Mr.
Jones's informer might have been Mr. Richard
Quiney, who lived in London, and died at Stratford
in 1656, at the age of 69 ; or Mr. Thomas Quiney,
our poefs son-in-law, who lived, I believe, till 1663,

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

287

and was twenty-seven years old when his father-in-
law died ; or some one of the family of Hathaway.
Mr. Thomas Hathaway, I believe Shakspeare's bro-
ther-in-law, died at Stratford in 1654-5, at the age
of 85.

There was a Thomas Jones, an inhabitant of
Stratford, who between the years 1581 and 1590 had
four sons, Henry, James, Edmund, and Isaac : some
one of these, it is probable, settled at Tarbick, and
was the father of Thomas Jones, the relater of this
anecdote, who was born about the year 1613.

If any of Shakspeare's brothers lived till after the
Restoration, and visited the players, why were we
not informed to what player he related it, and from
what player Mr. Oldys had his account ? The fact,
I believe, is, he had it not from a player, but from
the above-mentioned Mr. Jones, who likewise com-
municated the stanza of the ballad on Sir Thomas
Lucy, which has been printed in a former page.

288

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

SECTION XV.

ATTEMPT

TO ASCERTAIX

THE ORDER

IN WHICH

THE PLAYS OF SHAKSPEARE

WERE WRITTEN^

• Primusque per avia campi

Usque procul (necdum totas lux moverat umbras),
Nescio quid visu dubium, incertumque moveri,
Corporaque ire videt. Statius.

Trattando I'ombre come cosa salda. Dante.

Every circumstance that relates to those persons
whose writings we admire, awakens and interests our
curiosity. The time and place of their birth, their
education and gradual attainments, the dates of their
productions and the reception they severally met with,
their habits of life, their private friendships, and even
their external form, are all points, which, how little

^ The first edition of this Essay M'as published in January,
1778.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 289

soever they may have been adverted to by their con-
temporaries, strongly engage the attention of pos-
terity. Not satisfied with receiving the aggregated
wisdom of ages as a free gift, we visit the mansions
where our instructors are said to have resided, we
contemplate with pleasure the trees under whose
shade they once reposed, and wish to see and to
converse with those sages, whose labours have added
strength to virtue, and efficacy to truth.

Shakspeare, above all v\Titers, since the days of
Homer, has excited this curiosity in the highest
degree ; as perhaps no poet of any nation was ever
more idolized by his countrymen. An ardent desire
to understand and explain his works, is, to the honour
of the present age, so much increased within the last
forty years, that more has been done towards their
elucidation, during that period ^ than in a century
before. All the ancient copies of his plays, hitherto
discovered, have been collated with the most scru-
pulous accuracy. The meanest books have been care-
fully examined, only because they were of the age in
which he lived, and might happily throw a light on
some forgotten custom, or obsolete phraseology : and,
this object being still kept in view, the toil of wading
through all such reading as xvas never read has been
cheerfully endured, because no labour was thought
too great, that might enable us to add one new laurel
to the father of our drama. Almost every circum-
stance that tradition or history has preserved relative

7 Within the period here mentioned, the commentaries of
Warburton, Edwards, Heath, Johnson, Tyrwhitt, Farmer, and
Steevens, have been published.
VOL. II. U

290

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

to him or his works, has heen investigated, and laid
before the publick ; and the avidity with which all
communications of this kind have been received, suffi-
ciently proves that the time expended in the pursuit
has not been wholly misemployed.

However, after the most diligent inquiries, very
few particulars have been recovered, respecting his
private life or literary history : and while it has been
the endeavour of all his editors and commentators to
illustrate his obscurities, aud to regulate and correct
his text, no attempt has been made to trace the pro-
gress and order of his plays. Yet surely it is no in-
curious speculation to mark the gradations ^ by which

^ It is not pretended that a regular scale of gradual improve-
ment is here presented to the publick ; or that, if even Shak-
speare himself had left us a chronological list of his dramas, it
would exhibit such a scale. All that is meant is, that, as his
knowledge increased, and as he became more conversant with the
stage and with life, his performances in general were written
more happily and with greater art ; or (to use the words of Dr.
Johnson) ** that however favoured by nature, he could only im-
part what he had learned, and as he must increase his ideas, like
other mortals, by gradual acquisition, he, like them, grew wiser,
as he grew older, could display life better as he knew it more,
and instruct with more efficacy, as he was himself more amply in-
structed." Of this opinion also was Mr. Pope. '* It must be
observed (says he), that when his performances had merited the
protection of his prince, and when the encouragement of the
court had succeeded to that of the town, the works of his riper
years are manifestly raised above those of the former. — And I
make no doubt that this observation would be found true in every
instance, were but editions extant from which we might learn the
exact time when every piece was composed, and whether writ for
the town or the court." — From the following lines it appears,
that Dryden also thought that our author's most imperfect plays
were his earliest dramatick compositions :

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 291

he rose from mediocrity to the summit of excellence ;
from artless and sometimes uninteresting dialogues,
to those unparalleled compositions, which have ren-
dered him the delight and wonder of successive ages.

The materials for ascertaining the order in which
his plays were written, are indeed so few, that, it is
to be feared, nothing very decisive can be produced

" Your Ben and Fletcher in their first young flight,
** Did no Volpone, no Arbaces write :
" But hopp'd about, and short excursions made
*' From bough to bough, as if they were afraid ;
** And each were guilty of some Slighted Maid.

Shakspeare's own muse his Pericles first bore ;
*' The Prince of Tyre was elder than the Moor :
" 'Tis miracle to see a first good play ;
*' All hawthorns do not bloom on Christmas-day.
*' A slender poet must have time to grow,
*' And spread and burnish^ as his brothers do :
** Who still looks lean, sure with some p — is curst,
** But no man can be Falstaff fat at first."

Prologue to the tragedy of Circe.
The plays which Shakspeare produced before the year 1600,
are known, and are seventeen or eighteen in number. The rest
of his dramas, we may conclude, were composed between that
year and the time of his retiring to the country. It is incumbent
on those, who differ in opinion from the great authorities above-
mentioned, — who think with Rowe, that " we are not to look
for his beginnings in his least perfect works," it is incumbent, I
say, on those persons, to enumerate in the former class, that is,
among the plays produced before 1600, compositions of equal
merit with Othello, King Lear, Macbeth, The Tempest, and
Twelfth-Night, which we have reason to believe were all written
in the latter period ; and among his late performances, that is,
among the plays that are supposed to have appeared after the
year 1600, to point out pieces, as hasty and indigested, as Love's
Labour's Lost, The Comedy of Errors, and The Two Gentlemen
ot Verona, which, we know, were among his earlier works.

u 2

292

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

on this subject. In the following attempt to trace the
progress of his dramatick art, probability alone is pre-
tended to. The silence and inaccuracy of those per-
sons, who, after his death, had the revisal of his
papers, will perhaps for ever prevent our attaining
to any thing like proof on this head. Little then
remains, but to collect into one view, from his several
dramas, and from the ancient tracts in which they
are mentioned, or alluded to, all the circumstances
that can throw any light on this new and curious in-
quiry. From those circumstances, and from the
entries in the books of the Stationers' Company, ex-
tracted and published by Mr. Steevens (to whom
every admirer of Shakspeare has the highest obliga-
tions), it is probable that our author's plays were
written nearly in the following succession ; which,
though it cannot at this day be ascertained to be their
true order, may yet be considered as approaching
nearer to it, than any which has been observed in the
various editions of his works.

Of the twenty-one plays which were not printed
in our author's life-time ^ the majority were, I be-

1 They are King Henry VI. Part I., The Second and Third
Parts of King Henry VI. (as he wrote them) The Comedy of
Errors, The Taming of the Shrew, The Two Gentlemen of
Verona, King John, All's Well that Ends Well, As You Like It,
King Henry VIII. Measure for Measure, The Winter's Tale,
Cymbeline, Macbeth, Julius Caesar, Antony and Cleopatra,
Timon of Athens, Coriolanus, Othello, The Tempest, and
Twelfth -Night. None of these, except Othello, were printed in
quarto, but appeared first in the folio edition published by
Heminge and Condell, in 1623. Of these plays, seven, viz. The
First Part of King Henry VI. (allowing that play to be Shak-

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 293

lieve, late compositions®. The following arrange-
ment is in some measure formed on this notion. Two
reasons may be assigned, why Shakspeare's late per-
formances were not published till after his death.

1. If we suppose him to have written for the stage
during a period of twenty years, those pieces which
were produced in the latter part of that period were
less likely to pass through the press in his life-time,
as the curiosity of the publick had not been so long
engaged by them, as by his early compositions.

2. From the time that Shakspeare had the superin-
tendance of a playhouse, that is, from the year 1603 ^

speare's). The Second and Third Parts of King Henry VI. King^
John, The Comedy of Errors, The Taming of the Shrew, and
The Two Gentlemen of Verona, were certainly early compositions,
and are an exception to the general truth of this observation.
One other, viz. All's Well that Ends Well, though supposed to
have been an early production, was, it must be acknowledged,
not published in Shakspeare's life-time ; but for the date of this
play we rely only on conjecture.

^ This supposition is strongly confirmed by Meres's list of our
author's plays, in 1598. From that list, and from other circum-
stances, we learn, that of the fourteen plays which were printed
in Shakspeare's life-time, thirteen were written before the end of
the year 1600. The fourteen plays published in our author's
life-time, are — A Midsummer-Night's Dream, Love's Labour's
Lost, Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, King Richard II. King
Richard III. The First Part of King Henry IV. The Second Part
of King Henry IV. The Merchant of Venice, King Henry V.
Much Ado about Nothing, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Troilus
and Cressida, and King Lear.

9 None of the plays which in the ensuing list are supposed to
have been written subsequently to this year, were printed till
after the author's death, except King Lear, the publication of
which was probably hastened by that of the old play with the

294

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

when he and several others obtained a licence from
King James to exhibit comedies, tragedies, histories,
&c. at the Globe Theatre, and elsewhere, it became
strongly his interest to preserve those pieces unpub-
lished, which were composed between that year and
the time of his retiring to the country ; manuscript
plays being then the great support of every theatre.
Nor were the plays which he wrote after he became
a manager, so likely to get abroad, being confined to
his own theatre, as his former productions, which
perhaps had been acted on different stages, and of
consequence aflPorded the players at the several houses
where they were exhibited, an easy opportunity of
making out copies from the separate parts transcribed
for their use, and of selling such copies to printers ;
by which means there is reason to believe that some
of them were submitted to the press, without the
consent of the author.

The following is the order in which I suppose the
plays of Shakspeare to have been written, including,
for the sake of the discussion connected with it, the
first part of Henry the VI. which I believe to be the
composition of another writer.

same title, in 1605. — Tiie copy of Troilus and Cressida, which
seems to have been composed the year before King James
granted a licence to the company at the Globe Theatre, appears
to have been obtained by some uncommon artifice. ** Thank
fortune (says the editor) for the scape it hath made amongst you ;
since, by the grand possessors' wills, I believe, you should have
pray d for them [r. if] rather than been pray'd." — By the grand
possessors, Shakspeare and the other managers of the Globe
Theatre, were certainly intended,

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 296

1. First Part of King Henry VI 1589

2. Second Part of King Henry VI 1591

3. Third Part of King Henry VI 1591

4. Two Gentlemen of Verona 1591

5. Comedy of Errors 1592

6. King Richard the Second 1593

7. King Richard the Third 1593

8. Love's Labour's Lost 1594

9. Merchant of Venice 1594

10. Midsummer-Night's Dream 1594

11. Taming of the Shrew 1596

12. Romeo and Juliet 1596

13. First Part of King Henry IV 1597

14. Second Part of King Henry IV 1599

15. As You Like It 1599

16. King Henry V 1599

17. Much Ado About Nothing 1600

18. Hamlet 1600

19. Merry Wives of Windsor 1601

20. Troilus and Cressida 1602

21. Measure for Measure 1603

22. Henry VIII 1603

23. Othello 1604

24. Lear 1605

25. All's Well That Ends Well 1606

26. Macbeth 1606

27. Julius Caesar , 1607

28. Twelfth Night 1607

29. Antony and Cleopatra 1608

30. Cymbeline 1609

31. Coriolanus 1610

32. Timon of Athens 1610

296 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

33. Winter's Tale 1611

34. Tempest 1611

1. The First Part of King Henry VL 1589.

In what year our author began to write for the
stage, or which was his first performance, has not
been hitherto ascertained. And indeed we have so
few lights to direct our enquiries, that any speculation
on this subject may appear an idle expence of time.
But the method which has been already marked out,
requires that such facts should be mentioned, as may
serve in any manner to elucidate these points.

Shakspeare was born on the 23d of April, 1564,
and was probably married in, or before, September,
1582, his eldest daughter, Susanna, having been
baptized on the 26th of May, 1583. At what time
he left Warwickshire, or was first employed in the
playhouse, tradition does not inform us. However,
as his son Hamnet and his daughter Judith were
baptized at Stratford, Feb. 2, 1584-5, we may pre-
sume that he had not left the country at that time.

He could not have wanted an easy introduction to
the theatre ; for Thomas Greene ^ a celebrated co-

' *• There was not (says Heywood, in his preface to Greene's
Tu Quoque, a comedy), an actor of his nature in his time, of
better ability in the performance of what he undertook, more ap-
plauded by the audience, of greater grace at the court, or of more
general love in the city." The birth-place of Thomas Greene is
ascertained by the following lines, which he speaks in one of the
old comedies, in the character of a clown :

" I pratled poesie in my nurse's arms.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 297

median was his townsman, perhaps his relation, and
Michael Drayton was likewise born in Warwickshire ;
the latter was nearly of his own age, and both were
in some degree of reputation soon after the year

" And, born where late our swan of Avon sung,
** In Avon's streams we both of us have lav'd,
" And both came out together
Chetwood, in his British Theatre, quotes this passage from the
comedy of the Two Maids of Moreclack ; but no such passage is
there to be found. He deserves but little credit, having cer-
tainly forged many of his dates; however, he probably met with
these lines in some ancient play, though he forgot the name of
the piece from which he transcribed them. Greene was a writer
as well as an actor. There are some verses of his prefixed to a
collection of Drayton's poems, published in the year 1613. In
the register of the parish of Stratford, Thomas Greene, alias
Shaxpere, is said to have been buried there, March 6, 1589. He
might have been the actor's father.

* The turn of these lines is apparently borrowed from a pas-
sage in Milton's Lycidas. See v. 23, et seq. The whole is a
forgery by Chetwood. Steevens.

I cannot think this probable. Chetwood was not likely to have
been a writer of verses ; nor can I see much resemblance between
these lines and those referred to in Lycidas. That the reader
may form his own judgment on this point, I shall quote the
passage from Milton :

** For we were nurs'd upon the self same hill,
" Fed the same flock by fountain, shade, and rill.
*' Together both, ere the high lawns appeared
** Under the opening eye-lids of the morn,
** We drove a-field, and both together heard
" What time the gray-fly winds her sultry horn,
** Battening our flocks with the fresh dews of night,
*' Oft till the star, that rose, at evening bright,
" Toward Heaven's descent had slop'd his westering wheel."

Boswell.

298

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

1590. If I were to indulge a conjecture, I should
name the year 1591, as the era when our author com-
menced a writer for the stage ; at which time he was
somewhat more than twenty-seven years old. The
reasons that induce me to fix on that period are these.
In Webbe's Discourse of English Poetry, published
in 1586, we meet with the names of most of the
celebrated poets of that time ; particularly those of
George Whetstone ^ and Anthony Munday^, who

* The author of Promos and Cassandra, a play which furnished
Shakspeare with the fable of Measure for Measure.

3 This poet is mentioned by Meres, in his Wit's Treasury, 1598,
as an eminent comick writer, and the best plotter of his time. He
seems to have been introduced under the name of Don Antonio
Balladino, in a comedy that has been attributed to Ben Jonson,
called The Case is Altered, and from the following passages in
that piece appears to have been city-poet ; whose business it was
to compose an annual panegyrick on the Lord Mayor, and to
write verses for the pageants ; an office which has been discon-
tinued since the death of Elkanah Settle in 1722 :

** Onion. Shall I request your name?

*' Ant. My name is Antonio Balladino.

*' Oni. Balladino ! You are not pageant-poet to the city of
Milan, sir, are you ?

** Ant. I supply the place, sir, when a worse cannot be had,
sir. — Did you see the last pageant I set forth ?"

Afterwards Antonio, speaking of the plays he had written, says :

*' Let me have good ground, — no matter for the pen ; the plot
shall carry it.

*' Oni. Indeed that's right ; you are in print already for the

BEST PLOTTER.

** Ant. Ay, I might as well have been put in for a dumb-shew
too."

It is evident, that this poet is here intended to be ridiculed by
Ben Jonson : but he might, notwithstanding, have been deservedly

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. im

were dramatick writers ; but we find no trace of our
author, or of any of his works. Three years after-
wards, Puttenham printed his Art of English Poesy ;
and in that work also we look in vain for the name of
Shakspeare ^. Sir John Harrington, in his Apologie
for Poetrie, prefixed to the Translation of Ariosto
(which was entered in the Stationers' books Feb. 26,
1590-1, in which year it was published), takes occasion
to speak of the theatre, and mentions some of the
celebrated dramas of that time ; but says not a word
of Shakspeare, or of his plays. If any of his dra-
matick compositions had then appeared, is it imagi-
nable, that Harrington should have mentioned the
Cambridge Pedantius, and The Play of the Cards,
which last, he tells us, was a Londen [i. e. an English]
comedy, and have passed by, unnoticed, the new pro-
digy of the dramatick world ?

Sir Philip Sidney, in his Defence of Poesie, speaks
at some length of the low state of dramatick lite-
eminent. That malignity which endeavoured to tear a wreath
from the brow of Shakspeare, would certainly not spare inferior
writers.

4 The thirty-first chapter of the first book of Puttenham's Art of
English Poesy is thus entitled : *' Who in any age have bene the
most commended writers in our English Poesie, and the author's
censure given upon them."

After having enumerated several authors who were then ce-
lebrated for various kinds of composition, he gives this succinct
account of those who had written for the stage : " Of the latter
sort I thinke thus; — that for tragedie, the Lord Buckhurst and
Maister Edward Ferrys, for such doings as I have sene of theirs,
do deserve the hyest price; the Earl of Oxford and Maister
Edwardes of her Majestie's Chappell, for comedie and enterlude."

300 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

rature at the time he composed this treatise ; but has
not the slightest allusion to Shakspeare, whose plays,
had they then appeared, would doubtless have rescued
the English stage from the contempt which is thrown
upon it by this accomplished writer, and to which it
was justly exposed by the wretched compositions of
those who preceded our poet. The Defence of
Poesie was not published till 1595 ; but must have
been written some years before, as it is referred to by
Sir John Harrington, in 1591, in the essay already
mentioned. Sir Philip allows no merit to any of our
plays, excepting Gorboduck alone : " Our Tragedies
and Comedies, not without cause cried out against,
obseruing rules neither of honest ciuilitie, nor skilful!
Poetrie. Excepting Gorboduck (againe I say of
those that I haue scene) which notwithstanding, as it
is full of stately speeches, and well sounding phrases,
climing to the height of Seneca his stile, and as full
of notable moralitie, which it doth most delightfully
teach, and so obtaine the verie end of Poesie : Yet in
truth, it is verie defections in the circumstances,
which grieues me, because it might not remaine as an
exact modell of all Tragedies. For it is faultie both
in place and time, the two necessarie companions of
all corporall actions. For where the Stage should
alway represent but one place ; and the vttermost
time pre-supposed in it, should be both by Aristotles
precept, and common reason, but one day ; there is
both many dayes and many places, inartificially
imagined. But if it be so in Gorboducke, how much
more in all the rest ? " After ridiculing the extrava-

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 301

gance of the English dramatists, in their total
neglect of the unities of time and place, the neces-
sity of which Sidney, as a scholar, strenuously main-
tains, he proceeds to declaim against their mongrell
Tragicomedie, and the low buffoonery in which
they indulged : " But I speake to this purpose,
that all the end of the comicall part, be not vpon
such scornful matters as stir laughter only, but
mixe with it that delightfull teaching, which is the
end of Poesie. And the great fault euen in that
point of laughter, and forbidden plainly by Aristotle,
is, that they stir laughter in sinfuU things, which
are rather execrable then ridiculous : or in miseralbe,
which are rather to be pittied then scorned. For
what is it to make folkes gape at a wretched begger,
and a beggerly Clowne : or against law of hospitalitie,
to iest at strangers, because they speak not English
so well as we do ? What do we learn, since, it is
certain, ' Nil habet infoelix paupertas durius in se,
Quam quod ridiculos homines facit.' But rather a
busie louing Courtier, and a heartlesse threatning
Thraso ; a selfe-wise seeming schoolemaster ; a wrie
transformed Trauailer : these if we saw walke in
stage names, which we play naturally, therein were
delightfull laughter, and teaching delightfulnesse, as
in the other the Tragedies of Buchanan do iustly
bring forth a diuine admiration. But I haue lauished
out too many words of this play-matter; I do it,
because as they are excelling parts of Poesie, so is
there none so much vsed in England, and none can be
more pittifully abused ; which like an vnmannerly

302

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

daughte7% shewing a bad education, causeth her
mother Poesies honesty to he called in question'' It
is impossible to believe that our great poet could be
included in this censure.

But whatever grounds we may have for thinking
that none of his plays had appeared before 1591, it
is certain that Shakspeare had commenced a wTiter
for the stage, and had even excited the jealousy
of his contemporaries, before September, 1592. This
is now decisively proved by a passage extracted by
Mr. Tyrwhitt from Robert Greene's Groatsworth of
Witte bought with a Million of Repentance, in
which there is an evident allusion to our author's
name, as well as to a line in The Second Part of
King Henry VI.

This tract was published at the dpng request of
Robert Greene, a very voluminous writer of that
time. The conclusion of it, as Mr. Tpwhitt has
observed, is " an address to his brother poets to
dissuade them from writing for the stage, on account
of the ill treatment which they were used to receive
from the players." It begins thus : " To those gen-
tlemen his quondam acquaintance that spend their
wits in making playes, R. G. wisheth a better
exercise, and wisdome to prevent his extremities."
His first address is undoubtedly to Christopher Mar-
lowe, the most popular and admired dramatick poet
of that age, previous to the appearance of Shakspeare,
" Wonder not," (says Greene,) " for with thee mil
I first begin, thou famous gracer of tragedians, that
Greene (who hath said zvith thee, like the foole in

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 303.

his heart, there is no God), should now give glory
unto his greatness ; for penetrating is his power, his
hand is heavy upon me ; &c. Why should thy ex-
cellent wit, his gift, be so blinded, that thou should
give no glory to the giver ? — The brother [f. brea-
ther~\ of this diabolical atheism is dead, and in his
life had never the felicitie he aimed at : but as he
beganne in craft, lived in feare, and ended in de-
spair. And wilt thou, my friend, be his disciple ?
— Looke unto me, by him persuaded to that libertie,
and thou shalt find it an infernal bondage."

Greene's next address appears to be made to
Thomas Lodge. " With thee I joyne young Juve-
nall, that byting satirist, that lastly with mee toge-
ther writ a comedie. Sweet boy, might I advise
thee, be advised, and get not many enemies by
bitter words : inveigh against vaine men, for thou
canst do it, no man better, no man so well : thou
hast libertie to reprove all, and name none. — Stop
shallow water still running, it will rage ; tread on a
worme, and it will turn ; then blame not schoUers,
who are vexed with sharp and bitter lines, if they
reproove too much libertie of reproof."

George Peele, as Mr. Tyrwhitt has remarked, is
next addressed. " And thou no lesse deserving than
the other two, in some things rarer, in nothing in-
ferior, driven, as my selfe, to extreame shifts, a little
have I to say to thee : and were it not an idolatrous
oath, I would sweare by sweet S. George, thou art
unworthy better hap, sith thou dependest on so meane
a stay. Base-minded men all three of you, if by my

304 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

misery you be not warned : for unto none of you, like
me, sought those burs to cleave ; those puppets, I
meane, that speake from our mouths ; those anticks
garnish t in oiu* colours. Is it not strange that I, to
whom they all have bin beholding, is it not like that
you, to whom they all have been beholding, shall
(were yee in that case that I am now) be both of them
at once forsaken? Yes, trust them not, for there is
an upstart crow beautified with our feathers, that
with his tygres heart wrapt in a players hide, sup-
poses bee is as well able to bombaste out a blanke verse
as the best of you ; and being an absolute Johannes
fac-totum, is in his own conceit the only Shake-scene,
in a countrey. O that I might intreat your rare
wittes to be employed in more profitable courses ; and
let these apes imitate your past excellence, and never
more acquaynte them with yom* admired inventions."

This tract appears to have been written by Greene
not long before his death ; for near the conclusion he
says, " Albeit weakness will scarce suffer me to
write, yet to my fellow-scoUers about this city will
I direct these few insuing lines." He died, accord-
ing to Dr. Gabriel Harvey's account, on the third of
September, 1592 ^

I have already quoted a very scarce pamphlet en-
titled Kind Hart's Dreame, written by Henry Chettle,
from the preface to which it appears that he was the
editor of Green's Groatsworth of Wit, and that it was
published between September and December, 1592 ^

5 Additions by Oldys to Winstanley's Lives of the Poets, MS.
^ Probably in October, for on the Stationers' books I find The

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

305

Our poet, we find, was not without reason displeased
at the preceding allusion to him. As what Chettle
says of him, corresponds with the character which all
his contemporaries have given him, and the piece is
extremely rare, I shall extract from the address to the
Gentlemen Readers, what relates to the subject be-
fore us :

" About three months since died M. Robert
Greene, leaving many papers in sundry booksellers*
hands, among others, his Groatsworth of Wit, in
which a letter written to divers play-makers is offen-
sively by one or two of them taken ; and because on
the dead they cannot be revenged, they wilfully forge
in their conceites a living author : and after tossing
it to and fro, no remedy but it must light on me.
How I have, all the time of my conversing in printing,
hindered the bitter inveighing against schoUers, it
hath been very well known ; and how in that I dealt,
I can sufficiently prove. With neither^ of them that
take offence was I acquainted, and with one of them
[Marlowe] I care not if I never be. The other
[Shakspear], whom at that time I did not so much
spare, as since I wish I had, for that as I have mo-
derated the hate of living writers, and might have
used my own discretion, (especially in such a case, the
author being dead,) that I did not, I am as sorry as
if the original fault had been my fault ; because my
selfe have seen his demeanour no less civil than he

Repentaunce of Robert Greene, Master of Arts, entered by John
Danter, Oct. 6, 1592. The full title of Greene's pamphlet is,
" Greene's Groatsworth of Wit bought with a Million of Re-
pentance."

VOL. II. X

306

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

excellent in the qualitie he professes : Besides, di-
vers of worship have reported his uprightness of
dealing, which argues his honestie, and his facetious
grace in writing, that approves his art. For the
first, whose learning I reverence, and at the perusing
of Greene's booke, strooke out what then in conscience
I thought he in some displeasure writ; or had it been
true, yet to publish it was intollerable ; him I would
wish to use me no worse than I deserve. I had onely
in the copy this share : it was il written, as sometime
Greene's hand was none of the best ; licensed it must
bee, ere it could be printed, which could never bee if
it cuold not be read. To be brief, I writ it over, and
as near as I could followed the copy ; onely in that
letter I put something out, but in the whole book not
a word in : for I protest it was all Greenes, not mine,
nor Master Nashes, as some unjustly have affirmed.
Neither was he the writer of an Epistle to The
Second Part of Gerileon ; though by the workman's
error T. N. were set to the end : that I confess to be
mine, and repent it not.

" Thus, Gentlemen, having noted the private
causes that made me nominate myself in print, being
as well to purge Master Nashe of what he did not, as
to justifie what I did, and withall to confirm what
M. Greene did, I beseech you to accept the publick
cause, which is both the desire of your delight and
common benefit ; for though the toye bee shadowed
under the title of Kind Harts Dreame, it discovers
the false hearts of divers that wake to commit mis-
chief," &c.

That I am right in supposing the two who took

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 307

offence at Greene's pamphlet were Marlowe and
Shakspeare, whose names I have inserted in a pre-
ceding paragraph in crotchets, appears from the pas-
sage itself already quoted ; for there was nothing in
Greene's exhortation to Lodge and Peele, the other
two persons addressed, by which either of them could
possibly be offended. Dr. Farmer is of opinion
that the second person addressed by Greene is
not Lodge, but Nashe, who is often called Juvenal
by the writers of that time ; but that he was not
meant, is decisively proved by the extract from
Chettle's pamphlet; for he never would have la-
boured to vindicate Nashe from being the writer of
the Groatsworth of Wit, if any part of it had been
professedly addressed to him^. Besides, Lodge had
written a play in conjunction with Greene, called A
Ijooking-Glass for London and England, and was
author of some satirical pieces ; but we do not know
that Nashe and Greene had ever written in con-
junction.

Henry Chettle was himself a dramatick writer,
and appears to have become acquainted with Shak-
speare, or at least seen him, between Sept. 1592, and
the following December. Shakspeare was at this
time twenty-eight years old; and then we find from
the testimony of this writer his demeanour was no
less civil tha?i he excellent in the qualitie he pro-
fessed. From the subsequent paragraph — " Divers
of worship have reported his uprightness of dealing,

7 Nashe himself also takes some pains in an Epistle prefixed
to Pierce Pennilesse, &c. to vindicate himself from being the au-
thor of Greene's Groatsworth of Wit.

X 2

308 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

which argues his honestie, and his facetious grace in
writing, that approves his art, — " it may he reasonably
presumed, that he had exhibited more than one co-
medy on the stage before the end of the year 1592;
perhaps Love's Labour's Lost in a less perfect state
than it now appears in, and A Midsummer-Night's
Dream.

In what time soever he became acquainted with
the theatre, we may presume that he had not com-
posed his first piece long before it was acted ; for
being early incumbered with a young family, and not
in very affluent circumstances, it is improbable that
he should have suffered it to lie in his closet, without
endeavouring to derive some profit from it ; and in
the miserable state of the drama in those days the
meanest of his genuine plays must have been a va-
luable acquisition, and would hardly have been re-
fused by any of our ancient theatres.

In a Dissertation on the Three Parts of King
Henry VI. which I have subjoined to those plays, I
have mentioned that I do not beheve The First Part
of King Henry VI. to have been the composition of
Shakspeare ; or that at most he wrote but one or two
scenes in it. It is unnecessary here to repeat the
circumstances on which that opinion is founded. Not
being Shakspeare's play (as I conceive), at whatever
time it might have been first exhibited, it does not
interfere with the supposition already stated, that he
had not produced any dramatick piece before 1590.

The First Part of King Henry VI. which, I ima-
gine, was formerly known by the name of The His-
torical Play of King Henry VI. had, I suspect, been

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

309

a very popular piece for some years before 1592, and
perhaps was first exhibited in 1588 or in 1589. Nashe,
in a tract entitled Pierce Pennilesse his Supplication
to the Devill, which was first published in 15921^ ex-
pressly mentions one of the characters in it, John
Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury, who dies in the fourth
act of the piece, and who is not, I believe, introduced
in any other play of that time. " How " (says he)
" would it have joyed brave Talbot, the terror of the
French ^, to think that after he had lain two hun-
dred years in his tomb, he should triumph again on
the stage, and have his bones new embalmed with the
tears of ten thousand spectators at least, (at several
times,) who, in the tragedian that represents his per-
son, imagine they behold him fresh bleeding ?"

In the Dissertation above referred to, I have en-
deavoured to prove that this play was written neither
by Shakspeare, nor by the author or authors of the
other two plays formed on a subsequent period of the
reign of Henry the Sixth. By whom it zvas written,
it is now, I fear, impossible to ascertain. It was not
entered on the Stationers' books, nor printed, till the
year 1623, when it was registered with Shakspeare's

® Pierce Pennilesse his Supplication, &c. was first published in
that year, being entered for the first time on the Stationers'
books by Richard Jones, Aug. i 592. There was a second edition
in the same year, priated by Abell Jeffes for John Busbie.

9 Thus Talbot is described in The First Part of K. Henry VI.
Act I. Sc. Ill :

" Here, said they, is the terror of the French.''
Again, in Act V. Sc. I ;

" Is Talbot slain, the Frenchman's only scourge,
*' Your kingdom's terror'?"

310 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

undisputed plays by the editors of the first folio, and
improperly entitled The ThirdVart of KingHenry VI.
In one sense it might be called so, for two plays on
the subject of that reign had been printed before.
But considering the history of that king, and the
period of time which the piece comprehends, it ought
to have been called, what in fact it is. The First Part
of King Henry VI.

At this distance of time it is impossible to ascer-
tain on what principle it was that our author's friends,
Heminge and Condell, admitted The First Part of
King Henry VI. into their volume: but I suspect
they gave it a place as a necessary introduction to the
two other parts, and because Shakspeare had made
some slight alterations, and written a few lines in it.

Titus Andronicus, as well as The First Part of
King Henry VI. may be referred to the year 1589,
or to an earlier period; but not being in the present
edition admitted into the regular series of our author's
dramas, I have not given it a place in the preceding
table of his plays. In a note prefixed to that play,
which may be found in vol. xxi. p. 258, et seq. I have
declared my opinion that Andronicus was not written
by Shakspeare, or that at most a very few lines in it
were written by him ; and have stated the reasons on
which that opinion is founded. From Ben Jonson's
Induction to Bartholomew Fair, 1614, we learn that
this piece had been exhibited on the stage twenty-
five or thirty years before, that is, at the lowest com-
putation, in 1589 ; or, taking a middle period
(which is perhaps more just), in 1587. " A booke
entitled a Noble Roman History of Titus Andronicus,"

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

311

(without any author's name) was entered at Sta-
tioners' Hall by John Danter, Feb. 6, 1593-4. This
was undoubtedly the play, as it was printed in that
year according to Langbaine, who alone appears to
have seen the first edition, and acted by the servants
of the Earls of Pembroke, Derby, and Sussex. Of this
play there was a second edition in quarto in 1600,
and a third in 1611, in the title-page of which
neither the name of Shakspeare (though he was in
the zenith of his reputation), nor of any author, is
found, and therefore we may presume that the title-
page of the first edition also (like the entry on the
Stationers' books) was anonymous. Marlowe's King
Edward II. and some other old plays were performed
by the servants of the Earl of Pembroke, by whom
not one of Shakspeare's undisputed dramas was ex-
hibited.

% S. Second and Third Parts of K. Henry FL 1591.

In a Dissertation annexed to these plays, I have
endeavoured to prove that they were not written
originally by Shakspeare, but formed by him on two
preceding dramas, one of which is entitled The First
Part of the Contention of the Two famous Houses of
Yorke and Lancaster, &c. and the other The true
Tragedie of Richard Duke of Yorke, &c. My prin-
cipal object in that Dissertation was, to show from
various circumstances that those two old plays which
were printed in 1600, were written by some writer or
writers who preceded Shakspeare, and moulded by
him, with many alterations and additions, into the
shape in which they at present appear in his works

312 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

under the titles of The Second and Third Parts of
King Henry VI. ; and if I have proved that point, I
have obtained my end. I ventured, however, to go
somewhat further, and to hazard a conjecture con-
cerning the persons by whom they were composed :
but this was not at all material to my principal ar-
gument, which, whether my conjectures on that head
were well or ill founded, will remain the same.

The passage which has been already quoted from
Greene's pamphlet, led me to suspect that the old
plays were the production of either him or Peele, or
both of them. I too hastily supposed that the words
which have been printed in a former page, — " Yes,
trust them not ; for there is an upstart crow beau-
tified with owr feathers," &c. as they immediately
followed a paragraph addressed to George Peele, were
addressed to him particularly ; and consequently that
the word owr meant Peele and Greene, the writer of
the pamphlet: but these words manifestly relate
equally to the three persons previously addressed,
and allude to the theatrical compositions of Marlowe,
Lodge, Peele, and Greene ; whether we consider the
writer to lament in general that players avail them-
selves of the labours of authors, and derive more pro-
fit from them than the authors themselves, or sup-
pose him to allude to some particular dramatick per-
formances, which had been originally composed by
himself or one of his friends, and thrown into a new
form by some other dramatist, who was also a player.
The two old plays therefore on which the Second and
Third Parts of King Henry VI. were formed, may
have been written by any one or more of the authors

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

313

above enumerated. Towards the end of the Essay I
have produced a passage from the old King John,
1591, from which it appeared to me probable that the
two elder dramas, which comprehend the greater part
of the reign of King Henry VI. were written by the
author of King John, whoever he was ; and some cir-
cumstances which have lately struck me, confirm an
opinion which I formerly hazarded, that Christopher
Marlowe was the author of that play. A passage in
his historical drama of King Edward II. which Dr.
Farmer has pointed out to me since the Dissertation
was printed, also inclines me to believe, with him,
that Marlowe was the author of one, if not both, of
the old dramas on which Shakspeare formed the two
plays which in the first folio edition of his works are
distinguished by the titles of The Second and Third
Parts of King Henry VI.

Two lines in The Third Part of King Henry VI.
have been produced as a decisive and incontrovertible
proof that these pieces were originally and entirely
written by Shakspeare. " Who" (says Mr. Capell,)
" sees not the future monster, and acknowledges at
the same time the pen that drew it, in these two
lines only spoken over a king who lies stabb'd before
him, [i. e. before Richard Duke of Gloster,] —

" What, will the aspiring blood of Lancaster
Sink in the ground ? I thought it would have mounted."

let him never pretend to discernment hereafter, in
any case of this nature."

The two lines above quoted are found in The
True Tragedie of Richard Duke of Yorke, &c. on
which, according to my hypothesis, Shakspeare's Third

314

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

Part of King Henry VI. was formed. If therefore,
these lines decisively mark the hand of Shakspeare,
the old as well as the new play must have been
written by him, and the fabrick which I have built
with some labour falls at once to the ground. But
let not the reader be alarmed ; for if it suffers from
no other battery but this, it may last till the " crack
of doom." Marlowe, as Dr. Farmer observes to me,
has the very same phraseology in King Edward II. :

** scorning that the lowly earth

** Should drink his bloody mounts up to the air"

and in the same play I have lately noticed another
line in which we find the very epithet here applied to
the pious Lancastrian king ;

" Frown'st thou thereat, aspiring Lancaster?

So much for Mr. Capell's irrefragable proof. It is
not the proper business of the present Essay to enter
further into this subject. I merely seize this oppor-
tunity of saying, that the preceding passages now in-
cline me to think Marlowe the author of The True
Tragedie of Richard Duke of Yorke, &c. and per-
haps of the other old drama also, entitled The First
Part of the Contention of the Two famous Houses of
Yorke and Lancaster.

Of these plays, the first, as I have mentioned in my
Dissertation on the Three Parts, was printed in 1593,
and the second in 1594. They were both printed
together, anonymously, by Thomas Millington, in
quarto, in the year 1600.

A very ingenious friend has suggested to me, that
it is not probable that Shakspeare would have ven-

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 315

tured to use the ground-work of another dramatist,
and form a new play upon it, in the life-time of the
author or authors. I know not how much weight this
argument is entitled to. We are certain that Shak-
speare did transcribe a whole scene almost verbatim
from The old Taming of a Shrew, and incorporate it
into his own play on the same subject ; and we do
not know that the author of the original play was
then dead. Supposing, however, this argument to
have some weight, it does not tend in the slightest
degree to overturn my hypothesis that The Second
and Third Parts of King Henry VL were formed on
the two preceding dramas, of which I have already
given the titles ; but merely to show, that I am either
mistaken in supposing that they were new-modelled
and re- written in 1591? or in my conjecture concern-
ing the authors of the elder pieces on which those
of Shakspeare were formed. Greene died in Septem-
ber, 1592, and Marlowe about May, 1593. By as-
signing our poet's part in these performances to the
end of the year 1593 or the beginning of 1594, this
objection is done away, whether we suppose Greene
to have been the author of one of the elder plays, and
Marlowe of the other, or that celebrated writer the
author of them both.

Dr. Farmer is of opinion, that Ben Jonson par-
ticularly alludes in the following verses to our poet's
having followed the steps of Marlowe in the plays
now under our consideration, and greatly sui^passed
his original :

" For, if I thought my judgment were of years,
** I should commit thee surely with thy peers ;

316 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

** And tell how much thou did'st our Lily outshine^
" Or sporting Kyd, or Marlowe's mighty line."

From the epithet sporting, which is applied to
Kyd, and which is certainly in some measure a
quibble on his name, it is manifest that he must have
produced some comick piece upon the scene, as well
as the two tragedies of his composition which are
now extant, Cornelia, and The Spanish Tragedy.
This latter is printed, like many plays of that time,
anonymously. Dr. Farmer, with great probability
suggests to me, that Kyd might have been the author
of The old Taming of a Shrew printed in 1594, on
which Shakspeare formed a play with nearly the
same title \ The praise which Ben Jonson gives to
Shakspeare, that he " outshines Marlowe and Kyd,"
on this hypothesis, will appear to stand on one and
the same foundation ; namely on his eclipsing those
ancient dramatists by new-modelling their plays, and
producing pieces much superior to theirs, on stories
which they had already formed into dramas, that, till
Shakspeare appeared, satisfied the publick, and were
classed among the happiest efforts of dramatick art

' Kyd was also, I suspect, the author of the old plays of Ham-
let, and of King Leir. Seethe article on Hamlet.

^ At the close of the Dissertation on the three parts of Henry VL
I have informed the reader that Mr. Malone had altered his
opinion with regard to the original writers of the second and
third of these plays, but have not incoiporated in that Essay the
supposed correction which he has here made. That Marlowe
may have had some share in these compositions, I am not dis-
posed to deny ; but I cannot persuade myself that they entirely
proceeded from his pen. Some passages are possessed of so much
merit, that they can scarcely be ascribed to any one except the

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

317

4. Txvo Gentlemen of Verona, 1591.
This comedy was not entered on the books of the
Stationers' Company till 1623, at which time it was

most distinguished of Shakspeare's predecessors ; but the tameness
of the general style is very different from the peculiar characte-
ristics of that poet's '* mighty line," which are great energy both
of thought and language, degenerating too frequently into tu-
mour and extravagance. The versification appears to me to be
also of a different colour. Marlowe, as I have endeavoured to
show in the Essay on Shakspeare's Metre, although he was not
altogether free from the monotonous pomp of numbers which is
found in all his contemporaries, had less of it than any writer of
that time, and has introduced a variety of pauses into English
blank verse, which, however it may fall short of the endlessly
diversified melody of Shakspeare, yet places him, in this respect,
much above the models which were before him. Dr. Farmer's
interpretation of the passage in Ben Jonson's commendatory
verses, seems very hastily formed. Shakspeare might well be said
to have outshined Marlowe, Kyd, and Lilly, without its being sup-
posed that he had new-modelled their plays. From Lilly he
appears to have taken nothing ; and Kyd is conjectured to have
been a writer of comedy upon very slight foundation. Jonson is
in the habit of turning the author of Jeronimo into ridicule, and,
I believe^ upon this occasion, meant merely a quibble upon the
name of a writer whom he never could mention without some
ludicrous recollection. That Marlowe, Peele, and Greene, may
all of them have had a share in these dramas, is consonant to the
frequent practice of that age, of which ample proofs may be found
in the extracts from Henslowe's MSS. vol. iii.

I should not omit to mention here, that I find some slight me-
moranda by Mr. Malone, in which he seems to ascribe these
plays to so late a period as 1600. I have stated at the end of his
Dissertation, why I think his conjectures unfounded. I shall
only add here, that if Hamlet and Much Ado About Nothing are
correctly placed in 1600, it can scarcely be supposed that any
other dramas could be produced in the same year by Shakspeare.

Bo SWELL.

318

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

first printed; but is mentioned by Meres in 1598,
and bears strong internal marks of an early compo-
sition. The comick parts of it are of the same
colour with the comick parts of Love's Labour's Lost,
the Comedy of Errors, and A Midsummer-Night's
Dream ; and the serious scenes are eminently distin-
guished by that elegant and pastoral simplicity which
might be expected from the early effusions of such a
mind as Shakspeare's, when employed in describing
the effects of love. In this piece also, as in The
Comedy of Errors and Love's Labour's Lost, some
alternate verses are found.

Sir William Blackstone concurs with me in opinion
on this subject ; observing, that " one of the great
faults of The Two Gentlemen of Verona is the
hastening too abruptly and without preparation to
the denouement, which shows that it was one of
Shakspeare's very early performances."

The following lines in Act I. Sc. III. had formerly
induced me to ascribe this play to the year 1595 :

** He wonder'd, that your lordship

*' Would suffer him to spend his youth at home,
** While other men, of slender reputation,
*' Put forth their sons to seek preferment out :
Some to the voars^ to try their fortunes there^
** Some, to discover islands far auoayj"

Shakspeare, as has been often observed, gives to
almost every country the manners of his own : and
though the speaker is here a Veronese, the poet,
when he wrote the last two lines, was thinking of
England ; where voyages for the purpose of discover-
ing islands far away were at this time much prose-

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

319

cuted. In 1595, Sir Walter Raleigh undertook a
voyage to the island of Trinidado, from which he
made an expedition up the river Oronoque, to dis-
cover Guiana. Sir Humphry Gilbert had gone on a
similar voyage of discovery the preceding year.

The particular situation of England in 1595 I
had supposed might have suggested the line above
quoted ; " Some to the wars," &c. In that year it
was generally believed that the Spaniards meditated
a second invasion of England with a much more
powerful and better appointed Armada than that
which had been defeated in 1588. Soldiers were
levied with great diligence, and placed on the sea-
coasts, and two great fleets were equipped ; one to
encounter the enemy in the British seas ; the other
to sail to the West-Indies, under the command of
Hawkins and Drake, to attack the Spaniards in their
own territories. About the same time also Elizabeth
sent a considerable body of troops to the assistance of
King Henry IV. of France, who had entered into
an offensive and defensive alliance with the English
Queen, and had newly declared war against Spain.
Our author, therefore, we see, had abundant reason
for both the lines before us :

" Some to the wars, to try their fortunes there.
Some to discover islands far away."

Among the marks of love. Speed in this play
(Act II. Sc. I.) enumerates the walking alone, " like
one that had the pestilence." In the year 1593
there had been a great plague, which carried off near
eleven thousand persons in London. Shakspeare was

320

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

undoubtedly there at that time, and his own recol-
lection might, I thought, have furnished him with
this image. But since my former edition, I have
been convinced that these circumstances by no means
establish the date I had assigned to this play. When
Lord Essex went in 1591 with 4000 men to assist
Henry IV. of France, we learn from Sir Robert
Carey's Memoirs, p. 59, that he was attended by
many volunteers; and several voyages of discovery
were undertaken about that very time by Raleigh,
Cavendish, and others. There was a considerable
plague in London in 1583.

Valentinus, putting himself at the head of a band
of outlaws in this piece, has been supposed to be
copied from Sydney's Arcadia, where Pylades heads
the Helots. The first edition of the Aixadia was in
1590.

In The Two Gentlemen of Verona there are two
allusions to the story of Hero and Leander, which
I suspect Shakspeare had read recently before he
composed this play. Marlowe's poem on that sub-
ject was entered at Stationers' Hall, Sept. 18, 1593,
and I believe was published in that or the following
year, though I have met with no copy earlier than
that printed in quarto in 1598. Though that should
have been the first edition, Shakspeare might yet
have read this poem before the author's death in
1593 : for Marlowe's fame was deservedly so high,
that a piece left by him for publication was probably
handed about in manuscript among his theatrical
acquaintances antecedently to its being issued from
the press.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

321

In the following lines of this play,

" Why, Phaeton, (for thou art Merops'son,)
" Wilt thou aspire to guide the heavenly car,
" And with thy daring folly burn the world ? "

the poet, as Mr, Steevens has observed, might have
been furnished with his mythology by the old play of
King John, in two parts, 4to. 1591 :

** — as sometimes Phaeton,

** Mistrusting silly Merops for his sire."

Mr. Boaden justly observes to me that this comedy
in various places contains the germ of other plays
which Shakspeare afterwards wrote ; and this circum-
stance adds considerable support to the notion that
this was one of his earliest productions.

5. Comedy of Errors, 159^*
The only note of time that occui's in this play is

found in the following passage :

" Ant, S, In what part of her body stands —

France ?

" Drom, S. In her forehead, arm*d and reverted,
making war against the hair''

I have no doubt that an equivoque was here
intended, and that, beside the obvious sense, an allu-
sion was intended to King Henry IV. the heir of
France ^ concerning whose succession to the throne
there was a civil war in that country, from August

^ The words heir and hair were, I make no doubt, pro-
nounced alike in Shakspeare's time, and hence they are fre-
quently confounded in the old copies of his plays.

VOL. II. Y *

322

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

1589, when his. father was assassinated, for several
years. Henry, after struggling long against the
power and force of the League, extricated himself
from all his difficulties by embracing the Roman
Catholick religion at St. Denis, on Sunday the 21 5th
of July, 1593, and was crowned King of France in
Feb. 1594; I therefore imagine this play was
written before that period. In 1591 Lord Essex
was sent with 4000 troops to the French King's
assistance, and his brother Walter was killed before
Rouen in Normandy. From that time till Henry
was peaceably settled on the throne, many bodies of
troops were sent by Queen Elizabeth to his aid : so
that his situation must then have been a matter of
notoriety, and a subject of conversation in England.

This play was neither entered on the Stationers'
books, nor printed till 1623, but is mentioned by
Meres in 1598, and exhibits internal proofs of having
been one of Shakspeare's earliest productions. I
formerly supposed that it could not have been written
till 1596 ; because the translation of the Menaechmi
of Plautus, from which the plot appears to have been
taken, was not published till 1595. But on a more
attentive examination of that translation, I find that
Shakspeare might have seen it before publication;
for from the printer's advertisement to the reader, it
appears that, for some time before, it had been
handed about in MS. among the translator's friends.
The piece was entered at Stationers' Hall, June 10,
1594 ; and as the author had translated all the
comedies of Plautus, it may be presumed that the
whole work had been the employment of some yeai's :

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 323

and this might have been one of the earliest trans-
lated. Shakspeare must also have read some other
account of the same story not yet discovered; for
how otherwise could he have got the names of Erra-
ticus and Sm'reptus^ which do not occur in the trans-
lation of Plautus ? There the brothers are called
JVIenaechmus Sosicles, and Mensechmus the traveller.

The alternate rhymes that are found in this play,
as well as in A Midsummer-Night's Dream, Love's
Labour's Lost, The Two Gentlemen of Verona, and
Romeo and Juliet, are a further proof that these
pieces were among our author's earliest productions.
We are told by himself that Venus and Adonis was
" the first heir of his invention." The Rape of Lu-
crece probably followed soon afterwards. When he
turned his thoughts to the stage, the measure which
he had used in those poems, naturally presented
itself to him in his first dramatick essays : I mean in
those plays which were written originally by himself.
In those which were grounded, like the Henries,
on the preceding productions of other men, he na-
turally followed the example before him, and con-
sequently in those pieces no alternate rhymes are
found.

The doggrel measure, which, if I recollect right,
is employed in none of our author's plays except The
Comedy of Errors, The Taming of the Shrew, and
Love's Labour's Lost, also adds support to the dates
assigned to these plays : for these long doggrel verses,
as I have observed in a note at the end of the piece
now under our consideration, are written in that kind
of metre which was usually attributed by the dra-

Y 2

324

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

matick poets before his time to some of their inferior
characters. He was imperceptibly infected with the
prevailing mode, in these his early compositions ;
but soon learned to " deviate boldly from the common
track," left by preceding writers.

A play with the same title as that before us, was
exhibited at Gray's Inn in December, 1594 ; but I
know not whether it was Shakspeare's play, or a trans-
lation from Plautus. " After such sports (says the
writer of Gesta Grayorum, 1688,) a Comedy of Errors,
like to Plautus his Menechmus, was played by the
players : so that night was begun and continued to
the end in nothing but confusion and errors. Where-
upon it was ever afterwards called the Night of
Errors." The Registers of Gray's Inn have been
examined for the purpose of ascertaining whether the
play above mentioned was our author's ; but they
afford no information on the subject.

From its having been represented, by the players^
not by the gentlemen of the inn, I think it probable
that it was Shakspeare's piece.

The name of Dowsabel, w^hich is mentioned in this
play, occurs likewise in an Eclogue entitled The
Shepherd's Garland, by Michael Drayton, printed in
4to. in 1593.

6. King Richard IL 1593.

King Richard II. was entered on the Stationers'
books, August 29, 1597, and printed in that year.

There had been a former play on this subject,
which appears to have been called King Henry IV.
in which Richard was deposed, and killed on the

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 325

stage. This piece, as Dr. Farmer and Mr. Tyr-
whitt have observed, was performed on a publick
theatre, at the request of Sir Gilly Merick, and
some other followers of Lord Essex, the afternoon
before his insurrection : " so earnest was he," (Merick)
says the printed account of his arraignment, " to
satisfy his eyes with a sight of that tragedy which
he thought soone after his lord should bring from the
stage to the state." " The players told him the play
was old, and they should have loss by playing it,
because few would come to it ; but no play else would
serve ; and Sir Gilly Merick gave forty shillings to
Philips the player to play this, besides whatsoever he
could get

It may seem strange that this old play should have
been represented after Shakspeare's drama on the
same subject had been printed: the reason undoubt-
edly was, that in the old play the deposing King
Richard II. made a part of the exhibition : but in
the first edition of our author's play, one hundred
and fifty-four lines, describing a kind of trial of the
king, and his actual deposition in parliament, were
omitted: nor was it probably represented on the
stage. Merick, Cuffe, and the rest of Essex's train,
naturally preferred the play in which his deposition
was represented, their plot not aiming at the life of
the queen. It is, I know, commonly thought, that
the parliament-scene (as it is called), which was first
printed in the quarto of 1608, was an addition
made by Shakspeare to his play after its first repre-

^ Bacon s Works, vol. iv. 412. State Trials, vol. viii. p. 60.

326 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

sentation : but it seems to me more probable that it
was written with the rest, and suppressed in the
printed copy of 1597, from the fear of offending
Ehzabeth ; against whom the Pope had published a
bull in the preceding year, exhorting her subjects to
take up arms against her. In 1599 Hay ward pub-
lished his History of the First Year of Henry IV.
which in fact is nothing more than an history of the
deposing Richard II. The displeasure which that
book excited at court, sufficiently accounts for the
omitted lines not being inserted in the copy of this
play which was published in 1602. Hayward was
heavily censured in the Star-chamber, and committed
to prison. At a subsequent period (1608), when
King James was quietly and firmly settled on the
throne, and the fear of internal commotion, or foreign
invasion, no longer subsisted, neither the author, the
managers of the theatre, nor the bookseller, could
entertain any apprehension of giving offence to the
sovereign : the rejected scene was restored without
scruple, and from some playhouse copy probably
found its way to the press.

7. King Richard III 1593.
Entered at the Stationers' Hall, Oct. 20, 1597.
Printed in that year.

8. Love's Labour s Lost^ 1594.
Shakspeare's natural disposition leading him, as
Dr. Johnson has observed, to comedy, it is highly
probable that his first original dramatick production
was of the comick kind : and of his comedies Love's
La,bour's Lost appears to me to bear strong marks of

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 327

having been one of his earliest essays. The frequent
rhymes with which it abounds ^, of which, in his
early performances, he seems to have been extremely
fond, its imperfect versification, its artless and desul-
tory dialogue, and the irregularity of the composition,
may be all urged in support of this conjecture.

Love's Labour's Lost was not entered at Stationers'
Hall till the 22d of January, 1606-7, but is men-

3 As this circumstance is more than once mentioned, in the
course of these observations^ it may not be improper to add a few
words on the subject of our author's metre. A mixture of rhymes
with blank verse, in the same play, and sometimes in the same
scene, is found in almost all his pieces, and is not peculiar to
Shakspeare, being also found in the works of Jonson, and almost
all our ancient dramatick writers. It is not, therefore, merely
the use of rhymes, mingled with blank verse, but their frequency,
that is here urged, as a circumstance which seems to charac-
terize and distinguish our poet's earliest performances. In the
whole number of pieces which were written antecedent to the
year 1600, and which, for the sake of perspicuity, have been
called his early compositions, more rhyming couplets are found,
than in all the plays composed subsequently to that year, which
have been named his late productions. Whether in process of
time Shakspeare grew weary of the bondage of rhyme, or whether
he became convinced of its impropriety in a dramatick dialogue,
his neglect of rhyming (for he never wholly disused it) seems to
have been gradual. As, therefore, most of his early productions
are characterized by the multitude of similar terminations which
they exhibit, whenever of two early pieces it is doubtful which
preceded the other, I am disposed to believe (other proofs being
wanting) that play in which the greater number of rhymes is
found, to have been first composed. The plays founded on the
story of King Henry VL do not indeed abound in rhymes ; but
this probably arose from their being originally constructed by
preceding writers.

m LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

tioned by Francis Meres ^ in his Wit's Treasury,
being the Second Part of Wit's Commonwealth in
1598, and was printed in that year. In the title-
page of this edition (the oldest hitherto discovered),
this piece is said to have been presented before her
highness [Queen Elizabeth] the last Christmas
[1597], and to be newli/ corrected and augmented :
from which it should seem, either that there had been
a former impression, or that the play had been origin-
ally represented in a less perfect state, than that in
which it appears at present.

I think it probable, that our author's first draft of
this play was written in or before 1594 ; and that
some additions were made to it between that year
and 1597, when it was exhibited before the Queen.
One of those additions may have been the passage
which seems to allude to The Metamorphosis of Ajax,
by Sir John Harrington, printed in 1596 ; " Your

4 This writer, to whose list of our author's plays we are so
much indebted, appears, from the following passage of the work
here mentioned, to have been personally acquainted with Shak-
speare :

** As the soul of Euphorbus was thought to live in Pythagoras,
so the sweet soul of Ovid lives in mellifluous and honey-tongued
Shakspeare. Witness his Venus and Adonis, his Lucrece, his
sugred Sonnets among his private friends," &c. Wifs Treasury ,
p. 282. There is no edition of Shakspeare's Sonnets, now extant,
of so early a date as 1598, when Meres's book was printed ; so
that we may conclude, he was one of those friends to whom they
were privately recited, before their publication.

^ This book was probably published in the latter end of the
year 1598 ; for it was not entered at Stationers' Hall till September
in that year.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. ^29

lion — will be given to A-jax ^" This, however, is
not certain ; for the conceit of A-jax and a-jakes
may not have originated with Harrington, and may
hereafter be found in some more ancient tract.

In this comedy Don Armado says, — " The Jirst
and second cause will not serve my turn: the passado
he respects not, the duello he regards not : his dis-
grace is to be called boy ; but his glory is to subdue
man." Shakspeare seems here to have had in his
thoughts Saviolo's treatise Of Honour and Honour-
able Quarrels, published in 1595 \ This passage
also may have been an addition.

Bankes's horse, which is mentioned in the play
before us, had been exhibited in London in or before
1589, as appears from a story recorded in Tarleton's
Jests ^

* See vol. iv. p. 44-3, n. 4.

7 See a note on As You Like It, vol. vi. p. 503, n. 9.

^ ** There was one Bankes in the time of Tarlton, who served
the Earl of Essex, and had a horse of strange qualities ; and
being at the Cross Keyes in Gracious-streete, getting money with
him, as he was mightily resorted to, Tarlton then (with his
fellowes) playing at the Bell [f. Bull^ by, came into the Cross
keyes, amongst many people to see fashions : which Bankes per-
ceiving, to make the people laugh, sales, *Signior,'to his horse,
* go fetch me the veriest foole in the company.' The jade comes
immediately, and with his mouth drawes Tarlton forth. Tarlton,
with merry words, said nothing but * God a-mercy, horse.' In the
end Tarlton seeing the people laugh so, was angry inwardly, and
said, ' Sir, had I power of your horse, as you have, I would do
more than that.' * Whatever it be,* said Bankes, to please him, * I
will charge him to do it.' 'Then,' saies Tarlton, 'charge him to bring
me the veryest whore-master in the company.' ' He shall,' saies
Bankes. * Signior,' says he, 'bring Master Tarlton the veryest

330 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

In this comedy there is more attempt at delinea-
tion of character than in either The Comedy of
Errors or A Midsummer-Night's Dream ; a circum-
stance which once inclined me to think that it was
written subsequently to both those plays. Biron and
Katharine, as Mr. Steevens, I think, has observed,
are faint prototypes of Benedick and Beatrice.

The doggrel verses in this piece, like those in
The Comedy of Errors, are longer and more hobbling
than those which have been quoted from The Taming
of the Shrew :

*' You two are bookmen ; can you tell by your wit

" What was a month old at Cain's birth, that's not five

weeks old as yet ? " —
" O'my truth most sweet jests ! most incony vulgar wit,
*' When it comes so smoothly off, so obscenely as it were, so

fit;' &c.

This play is mentioned in a mean poem entitled
Alba, the Months Minde of a Melancholy Lover, by
R. T. Gentleman, printed 1598 :

" Love's Labour Lost I once did see, a play
" Y-cleped so, so called to my paine,
" Which I to heare to my small joy did stay,
*' Giving attendance to my froward dame :
** My misgiving mind presaging to me ill,
" Yet was I drawne to see it 'gainst my will.
* * x- * *

whore-master in the company.' The horse leads his master to him.
Then, * God a-mercy, horse, indeed,' saies Tarleton. The people had
much ado to keep peace : but Bankes and Tarleton had like to
have squared, and the horse by, to give aime. But ever after it
was a by word thorow London, ' God-a-mercy, horse ! ' and is to
this day." Tarleton' s Jests, 4;to. 1611.— Tarleton died in 1589.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. t3i

** Each actor plaid in cunning wise his part,
** But chiefly those entrapt in Cupid's snare ;
" Yet all was fained, 'twas not from the hart,
" They seeme to grieve, but yet they felt no care :
*' 'Twas I that griefe indeed did beare in brest,
" The others did but make a shew in jest."

Mr. Gildon, in his observations on Love's Labour's
Lost, says, he " cannot see v^^hy the author gave it
this name." — The following lines exhibit the train of
thoughts which probably suggested to Shakspeare this
title, as well as that which anciently was affixed to
another of his comedies, — Love's Labour Won :

*• To be in /ove, where scorn is bought with groans,
*' Coy looks with heart-sore sighs ; one fading moment's
mirth

" With twenty watchful, weary, tedious nights :

If haply uoorit perhaps a hapless gain ;
** If lost, why then a grievous labour tvon.'*

Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act I. Sc. I.

9. The Merchant of Venice, 1594

Entered at the Stationers' Hall, July 22, 1598; and
mentioned by Meres in that year. Published in 1600.

Among the extracts from Henslowe's MSS. we
find the Venesyan Comedy, acted in 1594. This was
probably The Merchant of Venice. In Act III.
Sc. II. Portia exclaims —

" He may win,

" And what is musick then? then musick is

Even as the flourish when true subjects bow
" To a new crowned monarch."

Shakspeare is fond of alluding to events occurring
at the time when he wrote, and the coronation of

332 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

Henry the Fourth of France, who was crowned at
Chartres in the midst of his true subjects in 1594,
(Rheims, where that ceremony ought to have taken
place, being possessed by the rebels,) seems to have
excited great interest in England. The following is
an extract from a pamphlet published on that subject,
entitled " The Order of Ceremonies observed in the
Anointing and Coronation of the Most Christian
French King of Navarre, Henry the HH. of that
Name, celebrated in our Lady Church in the Cittie
of Chartres, uppon Sonday the 27 of February, 1594.
Faithfully translated out of the French Coppie,
printed at Roan by Commaundment of the said Lord.
By E. A. London, Imprinted by John Windet,
and are to be sold by John Flasket, at the great north
doore of Paules."

After describing various parts of this ceremonial,
the writer proceeds thus, C 3. verso :

" Then the said Archbishop holding the King by
the hand, caused him to sit down, saying.

In hoc regni solio, confirmet te, &c,

" This prayer ended, and the king being set in his
throne, the said Archbishop took off his mitre, and
after great reverence and honour done by him to his
Majesty, he kissed him, and then sayd,

Vivat Rex in seternum, &c.

" After him all the other peeres kissed him, the
peeres ecclesiasticall first beginning, saying thus,

Vivat Rex in seternum, &c.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 333

" Then the people gave a great shout, crying God
save the King, and immediately the harquebuzes
shot off, and after them the great ordinance, and the
trumpets, cornets, hautbois, drommes, and other
instruments sounded ; and the said Lord Archbishop
begun, Te Deum laudamus, &c. being accompanied
with the organs and other musicke.

" During all this joy and acclamation the herauldes
cryed ' a largesse ; ' whereuppon were cast foorth a
great number of peeces of gold and silver, some money
current, others coyned purposely and marked with

the kings picture.

^ ^ ^ ^

" Here we are to note, that so often as the king
returned ever so little to the body of the church, the
people being in infinite number, cryed God save the
king ; and the church rung with theyr cries, and with
harquebuze shot."

After describing some other ceremonies, the author
then adds :

" Then the king thus arayed in his garments
royall, accompanyed with the aforesayd peeres, in
like ceremony and order as he came to church, re-
turned to his pallace.

" The people with great acclamation and signes
of joy, cryed God save the King ; the cannons and
small shotte played their parts, the trumpettes,
drommes, and other instruments, sounded and
played'''

10. j4 Midsummer ' Nigh fs Dream, 1594.
The poetry of this piece, glowing with all the

334

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

warmth of a youthful and lively imagination, the
many scenes which it contains of almost continual
rhyme ^ the poverty of the fable, and want of dis-
crimination among the higher personages, dispose me
to believe ^that it was one of our author's earliest
attempts in comedy \

9 See p. 327, n. 3.

* Dryden was of opinion that Pericles, Prince of Tyre, was our
author's first dramatic composition :

*' Shakspeare's own muse his Pericles first bore,
** The Prince of Tyre was elder than The Moor."

Prologue to the Tragedy of Circey by Charles
D'Avenant, 1677.
Mr. Rowe in his Life of Shakspeare (first edition) says, "There
is good reason to believe that the greatest part of Pericles was not
written by him, though it is owned some part of it certainly tvaSf
particularly the last Act.'' I have not been able to learn on what
authority the latter assertion was grounded. Rowe in his second
edition omitted the passage.

Pericles was not entered on the Stationers' books till May 2,
1608, nor printed till 1609; but the following lines in a metrical
pamphlet, entitled Pimlyco, or Runne Red-cap, 1609, ascertain
it to have been written and exhibited on the stage, prior to that
year:

" Amazde I stood to see a crowd
* Of civil throats stretch'd out so lowd:

" (As at anew play,) all the roomes

" Did swarm with gentiles raix'd with groomes ;

" So that I truly thought all these

" Came to see Shore or Pericles."
The play of Jane Shore is mentioned (together with another
very ancient piece not now extant) in The Knight of the Burning
Pestle^ 1613: '* I was ne'er at one of these plays before; but I
should have seen Jane Shore, and my husband hath promised me
any time this twelvemonth to carr}' me to The Bold Beauchamps/'
The date of The Bold Beauchamps is in some measure ascertained
by a passage in D'Avenant's Playhouse to be let :

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 385

It seems to have been written, while the ridiculous
competitions prevalent among the histrionick tribe
were strongly impressed by novelty on his mind.
He would naturally copy those manners first, with
which he was first acquainted. The ambition of a
theatrical candidate for applause he has happily
ridiculed in Bottom the weaver. But among the more
dignified persons of the drama we look in vain for
any traits of character. The manners of Hippolita,
the Amazon, are undistinguished from those of other
females. Theseus, the associate of Hercules, is not
engaged in any adventure worthy of his rank or
reputation, nor is he in reality an agent throughout
the play. Like King Henry VIII. he goes out a
Maying. He meets the lovers in perplexity, and
makes no effort to promote their happiness ; but
when supernatural accidents have reconciled them,
he joins their company, and concludes his day's
entertainment by uttering some miserable puns at an
interlude represented by a troop of clowns. Over
the fairy part of the drama he cannot be supposed to

** — There is an old tradition,

" That in the times of mighty Tamburlaine,
" Of conjuring Faustus, and The Beauchamps Bold,
" You poets used to have the second day."
Tamburlain and Faustus were exhibited in or before 1590.
The Lamentable End of Shore's Wife also made a part of the
old anonymous play of King Richard III. which was entered in
the Stationers' books, June 19, 1594. Both the dramas in which
Jane Shore was introduced were probably on the stage soon after
1590; and from the manner in which Pericles is mentioned in
the verses above quoted, we may presume, that drama was equally
ancient and equally well known.

336

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

have any influence. This part of the fable, indeed
(at least as much of it as relates to the quarrels of
Oberon and Titania), was not of our author's
invention ^ — Through the whole piece, the more
exalted characters are subservient to the interests of
those beneath them. We laugh with Bottom and
his fellows; but is a single passion agitated by the
faint and childish solicitudes of Hermia and Deme-
trius, of Helena and Lysander, those shadows of each
other ? — That a drama, of which the principal per-
sonages are thus insignificant, and the fable thus
meagre and uninteresting, was one of our author's
earliest compositions, does not, therefore, seem a very
improbable conjecture ; nor are the beauties with
which it is embellished, inconsistent with this sup-

* The learned editor of Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, printed
in 1775, observes in his introductory discourse (vol. iv. p. 161),
that Pluto and Proserpina in the Marchant's Tale, appear to have
been " the true progenitors of Shakspeare's Oberon and Titania."
In a tract already quoted, Greene's Groatsworth of Witte, 1592,
a player is introduced, who boasts of having performed the part
of the King of Fairies vsrith applause. Greene himself wrote a
play, entitled The Scottishe Historic of James the Fourthe,
slaine at Floddon, intermixed with a pleasant Comedie presented
by Oberon King of Fayeries ; which was entered at Stationers'
Hall in 1594<, and printed in 1598. Shakspeare, however, does
not appear to have been indebted to this piece. The plan of it
is shortly this. Bohan, a Scot, in consequence of being dis-
gusted with the world, having retired to a tomb where he has
fixed his dwelling, is met by Aster Oberon, king of the fairies,
who entertains him with an antick or dance by his subjects.
These two personages, after some conversation, determine to
listen to a tragedy, which is acted before them, and to which
they make a kind of chorus, by moralizing at the end of each
Act.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 337

position ; for the genius of Shakspeare, even in its
minority, could embroider the coarsest materials with
the brightest and most lasting colours.

Oberon and Titania had been introduced in a
dramatick entertainment exhibited before Queen
Elizabeth in 1591, when she was at Elvetham in
Hampshire ; as appears from A Description of the
Queen e's Entertainment in Progress at Lord Hart-
ford's, &c. printed in 4to. in 1591. Her majesty, after
having been pestered a whole afternoon with speeches
in verse from the three Graces, Sylvanus, Wood
Nymphs, &c. is at length addressed by the Fairy
Queen, who presents her majesty with a chaplet,

** Given me by Auberon [Oberon] the fairie king."

A Midsummer-Night's Dream was not entered at
Stationers' Hall till Oct. 8, 1600, in which year it
was printed ; but is mentioned by Meres in 1598.

From the comedy of Doctor Dodipoll, Mr. Stee-
vens has quoted a line, which the author seems to
have borrowed from Shakspeare :

" 'Twas I that led you through the painted meads,
Where the light Jairies danc'd upon the flovoerSy
" Hanging in every leaf an orient pearl'*

So, in A Midsummer-Night's Dream :
** And hang a pearl in ev'ry cowslip's ear."

Again:

" And that same dew, which sometimes on the buds
** Was wont to swell, like round and orient pearlsy
*' Stood now within the pretty JioureVs eyes,
" Like tears," Sec.

There is lio earlier edition of the anonymous play

VOL, II. z

338 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

in which the foregoing lines are found, than that iir
1600 : but Doctor Dodipowle is mentioned by Nashe,
in his preface to Gabriel Harvey's Hunt is up,
printed in 1596.

The passage in the fifth Act, which has been
thought to allude to the death of Spenser ^, is not
inconsistent with the early appearance of this comedy,
for it might have been inserted between the time of
that poet's death, and the year 1600, when the play
was published. And indeed, if the allusion was in-
tended, which I do not believe, the passage must have
been added in that interval; for A Midsummer-
Night's Dream was certainly written before 1598,
and Spenser, we are told by Sir James Ware (whose
testimony with respect to this controverted point
must have great weight), did not die till 1599 :
"others, (he adds,) have it xvrongly, 1598V So

5 ** The thrice three muses, mourning for the death
Of learning, late deceas'd in beggary."

* Preface to Spenser's View of the State of Ireland. Dublin,
fol. 1633. This treatise was written, according to Sir James
Ware, in 1596. The testimony of that historian, relative to the
time of Spenser's death, is confirmed by a fact related by Ben
Jonson to Mr. Drummond of Hawthornden, and recorded by that
writer. When Spenser and his wife were forced in great distress
to fly from their house, which was burnt in the Irish Rebellion,
the Earl of Essex sent him twenty pieces ; but he refused them ;
telling the person that brought them, he was sure he had no time
to spend them. He died soon afterwards, according to Ben Jon-
son's account, in King Street. Lord Essex was not in Ireland
in 1598, and was there from April to September in the following
year.

It should also be remembered that verses by Spenser are pre-
fixed to Lewknor's Commonwealth and Government of Venice,
published in 1599.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

339

careful a searcher into antiquity, who lived so near
the time, is not likely to have been mistaken in a
fact concerning which he appears to have made par-
ticular enquiries.

The passage in question, however, in my appre-
hension, has been misunderstood. It relates, I con-
ceive, not to the death of Spenser, but to the nine
Muses lamenting the decay of learnings in that
author's poem entitled The Tears of the Muses,

That this celebrated poet was alive in Sept. 1598, is proved
by the following paper, addressed by Queen Elizabeth to the
Lords Justices of Ireland, which is preserved in the Museum,
MSS. Harl. 286, and has not, I believe, been noticed by any of
his biographers :

«' Last of Sept. 1598.
*' To the Lords Justices of Ireland.

" Though we doubt not but you will without any motion
from us have good regard for the appointing of meete and ser-
viceable persons to be Sheriffs in the several counties, which is a
matter of great importance, especially at this time, when all
parts of the realme are tinged with the infection of rebellion,
yet wee thinke it not amisse sometime to recommend unto you
such men as wee should [wish] to have for that office. Among
whom we may justly reckon Edm. Spenser, a gentleman dwelling
in the county of Corke, who is so well known unto you all for
his good and commendable parts, (being a man endowed with
good knowledge in learning, and not unskilful or without ex-
perience in the service of the warres,) as we need not use many
words in his behalf. And therefore as we are of opinion that you
will favour him for himselfe and of your own accord, so we do
pray you that this letter may increase his credit so far forth with
you as that he may not fayle to be appointed Sheriffe of the
county of Corke, unlesse there be to you knowne some important
cause to the contrary.

" We are persuaded he will so behave himselfe in this parti-
cular as you shall have just cause to allowe of our recommenda-
tion, and his good service. And so," &c.

z 2

340

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

which was published in 1591 : and hence probably
the words, " late deceas'd in beggary." This allu-
sion, if I am right in my conjecture, may serve to
confirm the early date assigned to A Midsummer-
Night's Dream.

11. The Taming of the Shrew, 1596.
This play and The Winter's Tale are the only
pieces which I have found reason, since the first
edition of this Essay appeared, to attribute to an era
widely different from that in which I had originally
placed them \ I had supposed the piece now under
consideration to have been written in the year 1606.
On a more attentive perusal of it, and more expe-
rience in our author's style and manner, I am per-
suaded that it was one of his very early productions^
and near in point of time to the Comedy of Errors,
Love's Labour's Lost, and The Two Gentlemen of
Verona.

In the old comedies, antecedent to the time of our
author's writing for the stage, (if indeed they deserve
that name,) a kind of doggrel measure is often found,
which, as I have already observed, Shakspeare adopted
in some of those pieces which were undoubtedly
among his early compositions ; I mean his Errors,
and Love's Labour's Lost. This kind of metre being
found also in the play before us, adds support to the

7 A minute change has been made in the arrangement of five
other plays ; A Midsummer-Night's Dream, The Comedy of
Errors, Love's Labour s Lost, The Two Gentlemen of Verona,
and Cymbeline; but the variation is not more than a period of
two or three years.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 341

supposition that it was one of his early productions.
The last four lines of this comedy furnish an example
of the measure I allude to :

" 'Twas I won the wager, though you hit the white,
" And being a winner, God give you good night.
** Now go thy ways, thou hast tam'd a curst shrew,
*' 'Tis a wonder, by your leave, she will be tam'd so."

Another proof of The Taming of the Shrew heing
an early production arises from the frequent play of
words which we find in it, and which Shakspeare has
condemned in a suhsequent comedy.

Some of the incidents in this comedy are taken
from the Supposes of Gascoigne, an author of consi-
derable popularity, when Shakspeare first began to
write for the stage.

The old piece entitled The Taming of a Shrew,
on which our author's play is founded, was entered on
the Stationers' books by Peter Short, May 2, 1594,
and probably soon afterwards printed. As it bore
nearly the same title with Shakspeare's play (which
was not printed till 1623), the hope of getting a sale
for it under the shelter of a celebrated name, was
probably the inducement to issue it out at that time :
and its entry at Stationers' Hall, and publication in
1594^ (for from the passage quoted below it must
have been published gives weight to the suppo-

' It was published in 1596, and copie? of the edition are in the
libraries of the Dukes of Bridgwater and Roxburgh. Reed.

9 From a passage in a tract written by Sir John Harrington,
entitled The Metamorphosis of Ajax, 1596, this old play appears
to have been printed before that time, probably in the year 1594,
when it was entered at Stationers' Hall ; though no edition of so

342 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

sition that Shakspeare's play was written and first
acted in that year. There being no edition of the
genuine play in print, the bookseller hoped that the
old piece with a similar title might pass on the com-
mon reader for Shakspeare's performance. This ap-
pears to have been a frequent practice of the book-
sellers in those days ; for Rowley's play of King
Henry VIII. I am persuaded, was published in 1605,
and 1613, with the same view; as were King Leir
and his Three Daughters in 1605, and Lord Ster-
line's Julius Caesar in 1607.

In the year 1607 it is highly probable that this
comedy of our author's was revived, for in that year
Nicholas Ling republished The old Taming of a
Shrew, with the same intent, as it should seem, with
which that piece had originally been issued out by
another bookseller in 1594. In the entry made by
Ling in the Stationers' books, January 22, 1606-7,
he joined with this old drama two of Shakspeare's
genuine plays, Romeo and Juliet, and Love's La-
bour's Lost, neither of which he ever published, nor
does his name appear in the title page of any one of
our author's performances ; so that those two plays
could only have been set down by him, along with
the other, with some fraudulent intent.

In the same year also (Nov. 17), our author's ge-
nuine play was entered at Stationers' Hall, by J.

early a date has hitherto been discovered. *' Read" (says Sir
John) " the booke of Taming a Shrew, which hath made a
number of us so perfect, that now every one can rule a shrew in
our country, save he that hath her."

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 343

Smethwyck^ (one of the proprietors of the second
folio) ; which circumstance gives additional weight to
the supposition that the play was revived in that
year. Smethwyck had probably procured a copy of
it, and had then thoughts of printing it, though for
some reason, now undiscoverable, it was not printed
by him till 1631, eight years after it had appeared in
the edition by the players in folio.

It should be observed that there is a slight varia-
tion between the titles of the anonymous play and
Shakspeare's piece ; both of which, in consequence
of the inaccuracy of Mr. Pope, and his being very
superficially acquainted with the phraseology and
manner of our early writers, were for a long time
unjustly attributed to our poet. The old drama was
called The Taming of a Shrew; Shakspeare's comedy,
The Taming of the Shrew.

It must not be concealed, however, that The
Taming of the Shrew is not enumerated among our
author's plays by Meres in 1598; a circumstance
which yet is not sufficient to prove that it was not
then written : for neither are The Second and Third
Parts of King Henry VI. mentioned by him ; though
those plays had undoubtedly appeared before that
year.

I formerly imagined that a line ^ in this comedy

^ For this bookseller Romeo and Juliet was printed in 4to. in
1609, and an edition of Hamlet without date ; the latter was
printed either in that year or 1607.

* '* This is the way to kill a wife with kindness." Taming of
the Shrew, Act IV. Sc. L Heywood's play is mentioned in The
Black Booke, 4to. 1(304. I am not possessed of the first edition

344 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

alluded to an old play written by Thomas Heywood,
entitled A Woman Kill'd with Kindness, of which
the second edition was printed in 1607, and the
first probably not before the year 1600 ; but the
other proofs which I have already stated with respect
to the date of the play before us, have convinced me
that I was mistaken.

12. Romeo and Juliet, 1596.

It has been already observed, that our author in
his early plays appears to have been much addicted
to rhyming; a practice from which he gradually
departed, though he never wholly deserted it. In
this piece more rhymes, I believe, are found, than in
any other of his plays. Love's Labour's Lost and A
Midsummer-Night's Dream only excepted. This
circumstance, the story on which it is foimded, so
likely to captivate a young poet, the imperfect form
in which it originally appeared, and its very early
publication ^, all incline me to believe that this was
one of Shakspeare's first tragedies.

In a former edition of this Essay, I placed the
tragedy of Romeo and Juliet in 1595, not adverting
to a particular circumstance, which ascertains with
great precision that it must have been produced be-
tween the 23d of July, 1596, and the 17th of April,
1597 ; and from that, and other circumstances which
I shall presently state, and from the entry in the

of it, nor is it in any of the great collections of old plays that I
have seen.

3 There is no edition of any of our author's genuine plays ex-
tant, prior to 1597, vvhen Romeo and Juliet was published.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 345

Stationers' Registers, printed in a subsequent page *
(whether that entry relates to a ballad on the same
subject, or to the play itself; the former of which, I
believe to be the case) ; it is extremely probable that
this tragedy was first acted at the Curtain Theatre
in the autumn of 1596 ; and that it was published
early in the following year.

It is observable, that in the title-page of the ori-
ginal quarto copy of 1597, it is said that it had been
" often (with great applause) plaid publiquely by
the right honourable Lord Hunsdon his servants."
I formerly had not been aware that two noblemen of
this family in our author's time, Henry Lord
Hunsdon, tlie father, and George Lord Hunsdon, his
son, both filled the office of Lord Chamberlain of
the Household to Queen Elizabeth, though not
successively. Henry, the father, after holding this
station for eleven years, died on the 22d of July,
1596. The company of comedians who were his
lordship's servants, among whom Shakspeare, Bur-
bage, Heminge, Condell, and others, were enrolled,
during that period, or a considerable part of it, were
distinguished by the appellation of " the Lord Chan-
berlain's men." Having, however, been appended to
him, not as Lord Chamberlain, but as a peer of the
realm, on the death of their patron, they naturally
fell under the protection of his son and successor in
the title, and for some time continued to play under
his sanction, like the servants of Lord Derby, Lord

* *' August 5, 1596, a new ballad of Romeo and Juliet,"
licensed to Edward White.

346

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

Pembroke, or any other nobleman, who had not
enjoyed any official situation in the court of Elizabeth.
In August, 1596, the vacant office of Chamberlain
was given to William Brooke, the fourth Lord
Cobham (of that family), which station he held till he
died, on Saturday, the 5th of March, 1596-7^; a
period of about seven months ; and about six weeks
afterwards, George Lord Hunsdon was appointed
Lord Chamberlain in his room. During the interval
between the 22d of July, 1596, and the following
April, Shakspeare's company could only be denomi-
nated the servants of Lord Hunsdon, as they are
properly styled in the original title-page of this play;
nor did they recover their more honourable desig-
nation, till, on the 17th of April, 1597, the nobleman
by whom they were licensed, was advanced to the
office which Lord Cobham had held. Hence in the
autumn of that year ^, our poet's King Richard the
Second, and King Richard the Third, which I be-
lieve were originally acted whilst he and his fellows
were under the patronage of Henry the father, and
were then exhibiting under that of his son, were,
after he had been invested with the same office,, pro-
perly set forth, " as acted by the right honourable
the Lord Chamberlain his servants : " and the very
tragedy now vmder our consideration, when revised
and enlarged, was printed in 1599, as acted, not
by the Lord Hunsdon's servants (as in the former

5 In the Shrewsbury Papers, iii. 67, his death is placed on
February 24, 1597-8 ; but this is a mistake.

Andrew Wise paid for a licence to print King Richard II.
August 29, 1597 ; and King Richard III. on October 20, 1597.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 347

edition), but by those of the Lord Chamberlain.
These circumstances appear to me to ascertain the
date of Romeo and Juliet beyond a doubt.

The words " publiquely acted," which are found
in the title-page of the original edition, show, that
this tragedy was performed at a publick, in contra-
distinction to a private theatre ; and a passage in
Mars ton's Satires, which I have already had occa-
sion to notice, informs us, that it was played at
the Curtain Theatre, then occupied by the Lord
Cham.berlain's servants, and the fortunate spot
where our author's early dramatick productions were
first exhibited.

In Marston's tenth Satire, in which the author
portrays the various humours of the time, after a
description of Curio, ** a capering youth," who
thinks of nothing but dancing, Luscus, a constant
haunter of playhouses, is thus introduced :

*' Luscus, what's plaid to-day? i' faith now I know;
" I see thy lips a broach, from whence doth flow
•* Naught but pure Juliet and Romeo.
*' Say, who acts best ? Drusus, or Roscio ? —
" Now I have him, that ne'er of ought did speake
*' But when of playes or players he did treate ;

Hath made a common place booke out of plaies,
" And speakes in print, at least what ere he sayes,
** Is warranted by Curtain plaudities,
** If ere you heard him courting Lesbia's eyes."

In the third Act the first and second cause are
mentioned: that passage, therefore, was probably
written after the publication of Saviolo's Book on
Honour and Honourable Quarrels ; which appeared in
1591.

348 LIFE OF SHAKSPEAKE.

From several passages in the fifth Act of this
tragedy it is manifest, I think, that Shakspeare had
recently read, and remembered, some of the lines in
Daniel's Complaint of Rosamond, which, I believe,
was printed in 1592^ : the earliest edition, however,
that I have seen of that piece is dated in 1594 :

*' And nought-respecting death, the last of paines,

*' Plac'd his pale colours, (the ensign of his might,)

*' Upon his new-got spoil," &c. Complaint of Rosamond.

** I- beauty's ensign yet

** Is crimson in thy lips, and in thy cheeks,

" And death's pale flag,'' &c. Romeo and Juliet.

" Decayed roses of discolour'd cheeks

" Do yet retain some notes of former grace,

" And ugly death sits Jaire tvithin her face."

Complaint of Rosamond.

** Death that hath suck'd the honey of thy breath,
** Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty."

Romeo and Juliet.

*' Ah now methinks I see death dallying seeks
*• To entertaine itselfe in love's svoeet place,"

Complaint of Rosamond.

« Shall I believe

That unsubstantial death is amorous?"

Romeo and Juliet.

If the following passage in an old comedy already
mentioned, entitled Doctor Dodipoll, which had
appeared before 1596, be considered as an imitation,

* " A booke called Delia, containynge diverse sonates, with the
Complainte of Rosamonde^" was entered at Stationers' Hall by
Simon Waterson, in Feb. 1591-2, and the latter piece is com-
mended by Nashe in a tract entitled Pierce Pennilesse his Sup-
plication to the Divell, published in 1592.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

349

it may add some weight to the supposition that Romeo
and Juliet had been exhibited before that year :

The glorious parts of fair Lucilia,
** Take them and join them in the heavenly spheres,
" And fix them there as an eternal light,
** For lovers to adore and wonder at." Dr, Dodipoll.

*' Take him and cut him out in little stars,
" And he v^^ill make the face of heaven so fine,
" That all the world shall be in love with night,
" And pay no worship to the garish sun."

Romeo and Juliet.

In the fifth Act of this tragedy mention is made
of the practice of sealing up the doors of those
houses in which " the infectious pestilence did reign."
Shakspeare probably had himself seen this practised
in the plague which raged in London in 1593.

From a speech of the Nurse in this play, which
contains these words — " It is now since the earth-
quake eleven years," &c. Mr. Tyrwhitt conjectured,
that Romeo and Juliet, or at least part of it, was
written in 1591 ; the novels from which Shakspeare
may be supposed to have drawn his story, not men-
tioning any such circumstance ; while on the other
hand, there actually was an earthquake in England
on the 6th of April, 1580, which he might here have
had in view — It formerly seemed improbable to me
that Shakspeare, when he was writing this tragedy,
should have adverted, with such precision, to the
date of an earthquake which had been felt in his
youth. The passage quoted struck me, as only dis-
playing one of those characteristical traits, which

3 See Romeo and Juliet, Act \. Sc. IIL

350 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

distinguish old people of the lower class ; who delight
in enumerating a multitude of minute circumstances
that have no relation to the business immediately
under their consideration ^, and are particularly fond
of computing time from extraordinary events, such as
battles, comets, plagues, and earthquakes. This
feature of their character our author has in various
places strongly marked. Thus (to mention one of
many instances), the Grave-digger in Hamlet says
that he came to his employment, " of all the days
i' the year, that day that the last king overcame For-
tinbi^as, — that very day that young Hamlet was
born." — A more attentive perusal, however, of our
poet's works, and his frequent allusions to the man-
ners and usages of England, and to the events of
his own time, which he has described as taking place
wherever his scene happens to lie, have shown me
that Mr. Tyrwhitt's conjecture is not so improbable
as I once supposed it. Shakspeare might have laid
the foundation of this play in 1591, and finished it
at a subsequent period. The passage alluded to is in
the Jirst Act.

If the earthquake which happened in England in
1580, was in his thoughts, when he composed the
first part of this play, and induced him to state the
earthquake at V erona as happening on the day on
which Juliet was weaned, and eleven years before the

4 Thus Mrs. Quickly, in King Henry IV. reminds Falstaff, that
he " swore on a parcel-gilt goblet, to marry her, sitting in her
dolphin chamber, at a round table, by a sea-coal fire, on Wednes-
day in Whitsun-week, when the prince broke his head for liken-
ing his father to a singing man of Windsor."

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 351

commencement of the piece, it has led him into a
contradiction ; for, according to the Nurse's account,
Juliet was within a fortnight and odd days of com-
pleting her fourteenth year ; and yet, according to
the computation made, she could not well be much
more than twelve years old. Whether indeed the
English earthquake was, or was not, in his thoughts,
the nurse's account is inconsistent and contradictory.

Perhaps Shakspeare was more careful to mark the
garrulity, than the precision of the old woman : — or
perhaps, he meant this very incorrectness as a trait of
her character : — or, without having recourse to either
of these suppositions, shall we say, that our author
was here, as in some other places, hasty and inatten-
tive ? It is certain that there is nothing in which
he is less accurate, than the computation of time.
Of his negligence in this respect, As You Like It,
Measure for Measure, and Othello, furnish remark-
able instances ^.

13. King John, 1596.

This historical play was founded on a former drama,
entitled The Troublesome Raigne of John King
of England, with the Discoverie of King Richard
Cordelion's base Son, vulgarly named the Bastard
Fawconbridge : also the Death of King John at
Swinstead Abbey. As it was (sundry times) pub-
likely acted by the Queenes Majesties Players in the
honourable Cittie of London. This piece, which is

5 See Measure for Measure, Act I. Sc. IIL and IV. — As You
Like It, Act IV. Sc. I. and III.— Othello, Act III. Sc. III. : " I
slept the next night well," &c.

352

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

in two parts, and was printed at London for Sampson
Clarke, 1591, has no author's name in the title-page.
On its republication in 1611, the bookseller for whom
it was printed, inserted the letters JV. Sh. in the title-
page ; and in order to conceal his fraud, omitted the
words — publikely — in the honourable Cittie of
London, which he was aware would proclaim this
play not to be Shakspeare's King John ; the com-
pany to which he belonged, having no publick theatre
in London : that in Blackfriars being a private play-
house, and the Globe, which was a publick theatre,
being situated in Southwark. He also, probably
with the same view, omitted the following lines ad-
dressed to the Gentlemen Readers, which are pre-
fixed to the first edition of the old play :

*' You that with friendly grace of smoothed brow

*' Have entertain'd the Scythian Tamburlaine,

** And given applause unto an infidel ;

" Vouchsafe to welcome, with like curtesie,

*' A warlike Christian, and your countrj^man.

*' For Christ's true faith indur'd he many a storrae,

" And set himselfe against the man'of Rome,

Until base treason by a damned wight
" Did all his former triumphs put to flight.
" Accept of it, svreete gentles, in good sort,
** And thinke it was prepar'd for your disport."

Shakspeare's play being then probably often acted,
and the other wholly laid aside, the word lately was
substituted for the word publickly : — as they were
sundry times lately acted," &c.

Thomas Dewe, for whom a third edition of this
old play was printed in 1622, was more daring.
The two parts were then published, " as they were

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 353

sundry times lately acted ; " and the name of Wil-
liam Shakspeare inserted at length. " By the Queen's
Majesties 'players" was wisely omitted, as not being
very consistent with the word lately, Elizabeth being
then dead nineteen years.

King John is the only one of our poet's uncon-
tested plays that is not entered in the books of the
Stationers' Company. It was not printed till 1623,
but is mentioned by Meres in 1598, unless he mis-
took the old play in two parts, printed in 1591> for
the composition of Shakspeare.

It is observable, that our author's son, Hamnet,
died in August, 1596. That a man of such sensi-
bility, and of so amiable a disposition, should have
lost his only son, who had attained the age of twelve
years, without being greatly affected by it, will not
be easily credited. The pathetick lamentations which
he has written for Lady Constance on the death of
Arthur, may perhaps add some probability to the
supposition that this tragedy was written at or soon
after that period.

In the first scene of the second Act the following
lines are spoken by Chatillon, the French ambassador,
on his return from England to King Philip :

" And all the unsettled humours of the land —
" Rash, inconsiderate, fiery voluntaries,
" With ladies' faces and fierce dragons' spleens, —
*' Have sold their fortunes at their native homes,
" Bearing their birth-rights proudly on their backs,
*' To make a hazard of new fortunes here.
" In brief, a braver choice of dauntless spirits
*' Than now the English bottoms have waft o'er,
VOL. II. 2 A

354

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

*' Did never float upon the swelling tide,

** To do offence and scathe to Christendom."

Dr. Johnson has justly observed, in a note on this
play, that many passages in our poet's works evi-
dently show that " he often took advantage of the
facts then recent, and the passions then in motion."
Perhaps the description contained in the last six lines
was immediately suggested to Shakspeare by the
grand fleet which was sent against Spain in 1596. It
consisted of eighteen of the largest of the Queen's
ships, three of the Lord Admiral's, and above one
hundred and twenty merchant-ships and victuallers,
under the command of the earls of Nottingham and
Essex. The regular land-forces on board amounted
to ten thousand ; and there was also a large body
of voluntaries (as they were then called), under the
command of Sir Edward Winkfield. Many of the
nobility went on this expedition, which was destined
against Cadiz. The fleet sailed from Plymouth on
the third of June, 1596 ; before the end of that
month the great Spanish armada was destroyed, and
the town of Cadiz was sacked and bm-ned. Here
Lord Essex found 1200 pieces of ordnance, and an
immense quantity of treasure, stores, ammunition,
&c. valued at twenty million of ducats. The vic-
torious commanders of this successful expedition
returned to Plymouth, August 8, 1596, four days
before the death of our poet's son. Many of our old
historians speak of the splendour and magnificence
displayed by the noble and gallant adventurers who
served in this expedition ; and Ben Jonson has par-

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 355

ticularly alluded to it in his Silent Woman, written
a few years afterwards ^. To this I suspect two lines
already quoted particularly refer :

" Have sold their fortunes at their native homes,
*' Bearing their birth-rights proudly on their backs'*

Dr. Johnson conceived that the following lines in
this play —

" And meritorious shall that hand be call'd.

Canonized, and vi^orshipp'd as a saint,
'* That takes away by any secret course
« Thy hateful life—.*'

might either refer to the bull published against Queen
Elizabeth, or to the canonization of Garnet, Faux,
and their accomplices, who, in a Spanish book which
he had seen, are registered as saints. If the latter
allusion had been intended, then this play, or at least
this part of it, must have been written after 1605.
But the passage in question is founded on a similar
one in the old play, printed in 1591, and therefore
no allusion to the gunpowder-plot could have been
intended.

A line of The Spanish Tragedy is quoted in King
John, That tragedy, I believe, had appeared in or
before 1590.

In the first Act of King John, an ancient tragedy,
entitled Solyman and Perseda, is alluded to. The
earliest edition of that play, now extant;, is that of
1599, but it was written, and probably acted, many

5 " I had as fair a gold jerkin on that day as any was worn in
the Island Voyage, or Cadiz, none dispraised."

Silent Womatiy 1609,

2 A 2

356 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

years before ; for it was entered on the Stationers'
books, by Edward Whyte, Nov. 20, 1592.

Marston's Insatiate Countess, which, according to
Langbaine, was printed in 1603, contains a passage,
which, if it should be considered as an imitation of a
similar one in King John, will ascertain this histo-
rical drama to have been written at least before that
year :

" Then how much more in me, whose youthful veins»
" Like a proud river, overjio'w their bounds."

So, in King John :

" Why holds thine eye that lamentable rheum,
" Like a proud river peering oer his bounds'^"

Marston has in many other places imitated Shak-
speare.

A speech spoken by the Bastard in the second Act
of this tragedy ^ seems to have been formed on one
in an old play entitled The famous History of Captain
Thomas Stukely. Captain Stukely was killed in
1578. The drama of which he is the subject, was
not printed till 1605, but it is in the black letter,
and, I believe, had been exhibited at least fifteen
years before.

Of the only other note of time which I have ob-
served in this tragedy, beside those aheady men- ^
tioned, I am unable to make any use. " When I
was in France,'' says young Arthur,

" Young gentlemen would be as sad as night,
** Only for wantonness."

See vol. XV. p. 251.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 357

I have not been able to ascertain when the fashion
of being sad and gentlemanlike commenced among
our gayer neighbours on the continent. A similar
fashion prevailed in England, and is often alluded
to by our poet, and his contemporaries. Perhaps he
has in this instance attributed to the French a species
of affectation then only found in England. It is
noticed by Lyly in 1592, and Ben Jonson in 1598.

13. First Part of King Henry IF, 1597.

Entered, Feb. 25, 1597. [1597-8.] Written
therefore probably in 1597. Printed in 1598,

14. Second Part of King Henry IV. 1598.

The Second Part of King Henry IV. was entered
in the Stationers' books, August 23, 1600, and was
printed in that year. It was written, I believe, in
1598. From the epilogue it appears to have been
composed before King Henry V. which itself must
have been written in or before 1599.

Meres in his Wit's Treasury, which was published
in September, 1598, has given a list of our author's
plays, and among them is King Henry IV. ; but as
he does not describe it as a play in two parts, I
doubt whether this second part had been exhibited,
though it might have been then written. If it was
not in his contemplation, it may be presumed to have
appeared in the latter part of the year 1598. His
words are these: " As Plautus and Seneca are
accounted the best for comedy and tragedy, among
the Latinos, so Shakspeare, among the English, is
the most excellent in both kinds for the stage ; for

358 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

comedy, witness his Gentlemen of Verona, his Errors,
his Love's Labour's Lost, his Love's Labour's Wonne^
his Midsummer-Night's Dream, and his Merchant of
Venice; for tragedy^, his Richard IL Richard I IL
Henry IV. King John, Titus Andronicus, and his
Romeo and Juhet

The following allusion to one of the characters
in this play, which is found in Every Man out of
his Humour, Act V. Sc. II. first acted in 1599, is
an additional authority for supposing The Second
Part of King Henry IV. to have been written in
1598 :

" Sa^i. What's he, gentle Mons. Brisk ? Not
that gentleman ?

" Fast. No, lady ; this is a kinsman to Justice
Shallow:'

That this play was not written before the year
1596, is ascertained by the following allusions. In
the last Act, Clarence, speaking of his father, says,

*^ The incessant care and labour of his mind

" Hath wrought the mure that should confine it in,

** So thin, that life looks through, and will break out."

These lines appear to have been formed on the
following in Daniel's Civil Warres, 1595, b. iii*
St. 116 :

** Wearing the wall so thin, that now the mind
" Might well look thorough, and his frailty find."

^ The circumstance of Hotspur's death in this play, and its
being an historical drama, I suppose, induced Meres to denomi-
nate The First Part of King Henry IV. a tragedy.

9 Wit's Treasury, p. 282.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 359

Daniel's Poem, though not published till 1595,
was entered on the Stationers' books, in October,
1594.

The distich, with which Pistol consoles himself.
Si for tuna me torment a, &c. had, I believe, ap-
peared in an old collection of tales, and apophthegms,
entitled Wits, Fits, and Fancies, which was entered
at Stationers' Hall in 1595, and probably printed in
that year. Sir Richard Hawkins, as Dr. Farmer has
observed, " in his voyage to the South Sea in 1593,
throws out the same jingling distich on the loss of his
pinnace." But no account of that voyage was pub-
lished before 1598.

In the last Act of this play the young king thus
addresses his brothers :

" Brothers, you mix your sadness with some fear.
" This is the English, not the Turkish court ;
*' Not Amurath an Araurath succeeds.
But Harry Harry."

It is highly probable, as is observed in a note on
that passage, that Shakspeare had here in contem-
plation the cruelty practised by the Turkish emperor,
Mahomet, who after the death of his father, Amu-
rath the Third, in Feb. 1596 \ invited his unsus-
pecting brothers to a feast, and caused them all to
be strangled.

15. King Henry V. 1599.
Mr. Pope thought that this historical drama was

^ The affairs of this court had previously attracted the publick
attention; for in 1594- was published at London, A Letter sent
by Amurath the great Turke to Christendom.

360 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

one of our author's latest compositions ; but he was
evidently mistaken. King Henry V. was entered on
the Stationers' books, Aug. 14, 1600, and printed in
the same year. It was written after the Second
Part of King Henry IV. being promised in the epi-
logue of that play ; and while the Earl of Essex was
in Ireland^. Lord Essex went to Ireland April 15,
1599, and returned to London on the 28th of Sep-
tember in the same year. So that this play (unless
the passage relative to him was inserted after the
piece was finished) must have been composed between
April and September, 1599. Svipposing that pas-
sage a subsequent insertion, the play was probably
not written long before ; for it is not mentioned by
Meres in 1598.

The prologue to Ben Jonson's Every Man in his
Humour * seems clearly to allude to this play ; and,
if it had been written at the same time with the
piece itself, might induce us, notwithstanding the
silence of Meres, to place King Henry V. a year or
two earlier ; for Every Man in his Humour is said
to have been acted in 1598. But the prologue which
now appears before it, was not written till after 1601,
when the play was printed without the prologue,
which first appeared in the folio edition of Jonson's
Works, published in 1616^. It is certain, that, not

3 See the Chorus to the fifth Act of King Henry V.
♦ ** He rather prays, you will be pleased to see
" One such, to day, as other plays should be ;
*' Where neither Chorus ivafts you o'er the seaSy' &c.

Prologue to Every Man in his Humour. Foi. 1616..
5 I had formerly supposed that Every Man in his Humour was
Jonson's first dramatick performance ; but the discovery of Herjr

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 361

long after the year 1600, a coolness ^ arose between
Shakspeare and him, which, however he may talk of

slowe's MSS. renders this very doubtful. That register contains
a curious account of payments made to Jonson, at various times,
for his labours in writing for the theatre. See vol. iii. p. 333.

^ See an old comedy called The Return from Parnassus :
(This piece was not published till 1606 ; but appears to have
been written in 1602, — certainly was produced before the death
of Queen Elizabeth, which happened on the 24th of March,
1602-3.] " Why here's our fellow Shakspeare puts them all
down ; ay and Ben Jonson too. O, that Ben Jonson is a pes-
tilent fellow ; he brought up Horace giving the poets a pill, but
our fellow Shakspeare hath given him a purge that made him
bewray his credit."

The play of Jonson's in which he gave the poets a pill, is the
Poetaster, acted in 1601. In that piece some passages of King
Henry V. are ridiculed. In what manner Shakspeare put him
down, or made him hexvray his credit, does not appear. His
retaliation, we may be well assured, contained no gross or illi-
beral abuse ; and, perhaps, did not go beyond a ballad or an
epigram, which may have perished with things of greater con-
sequence. He has, however, marked his disregard for the calum-
niator of his fame, by not leaving him any memorial by his Will.
^In an apologetical dialogue which Jonson annexed to the Poet-
aster, he says, he had been provoked for three years (i. e. from
1598 to 1601) on every stage by slanderers; as for the players,
he says,

** It is true, I tax'd them,

*' And yet but some, and those so sparingly,
*' As all the rest might have sat still unquestion'd : —
** — What they have done against me
*' I am not mov'd with. If it gave them meat,
*• Or got them cloaths, 'tis well ; that was their end.
*' Only, amongst them, I am sorry for
** Some better natures, by the rest drawn in
" To run in that vile line."
By the words Some better natures," there can, I think, be
,little doubt that Shakspeare was alluded to.

362 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

his almost idolatrous affection, produced on his part,
from that time to the death of our author, and for
many years afterwards, much clumsy sarcasm, and
many malevolent reflections

7 In his Silent Woman, 1609, ActV. Sc. II. Jonson perhaps
pointed at Shakspeare, as one whom he viewed with scornful, yet
with jealous, eyes :

** So they may censure poets and authors, and compare them ;
Daniel with Spenser, Jonson with t'other youth, and so forth."
Decker, however, might have been meant.

Again, in the same play :

'* You two shall be the chorus behind the arras, and whip out
between the acts, and speak."

In the Induction to Bartholomew Fair, which was acted in
1614?, two years before the death of our author, three of his
plays, and in the piece itself two others, are attempted to be
ridiculed.

In The Devil's an Ass, acted in 1616, all his historical plays are
obliquely censured ;

" Meer-er. By my faith you are cunning in the chronicles.

** Fitz-dot. No, I confess, I ha't from the play-books, and
think they are more authentick."

They are again attacked in the Induction to Bartholomew
Fair:

** An some writer that I know, had but the penning o' this
matter, he would ha' made you such ^jig-a-jog the booths, you
should ha' thought an earthquake had been in the fair. But these
master-poets, they will ha' their own absurd courses, they will be
informed of nothing."

Tlie following passage in Cynthia's Revels, 1601, was, I think,
likewise pointed against Shakspeare :

*' Besides, they would wish our poets would leave to be pro-
moters of other men's jests, and to way-lay all the stale apothegms
or old books they can hear of in print or otherwise, to farce their
scenes withal : — Again, that feeding their friends with nothing
of their own, but what they have twice or thrice cooked, they
should not wantonly give out how so{)n they had dress'd it, nor

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 363

Dn this play, Mr. Pope has the following hote,
Act L Sc. I. :

" This first scene was added since the edition of
1608, which is much short of the present editions,

bow many coaches came to carry away the broken meat, besides
hobby-horses and foot-cloth nags."

Jonson's plots were all his own invention ; our author's chiefly
taken from preceding plays or novels. The former employed a
year or two in composing a play ; the latter probably produced
two every year, while he remained in the theatre.

The Induction to The Staple of News, which appeared in
1625, not very long after the publication of our author's plays in
folio, contains a sneer at a passage in Julius Caesar:

" Know, Caesar doth not wrong ; nor without causQ
Will he be satisfied."
which for the purpose of ridicule is quoted unfaithfully ; and in
the same play may be found an effort, as impotent as that of
Voltaire *, to raise a laugh at Hamlet's exclamation when he
kills Polonius.

Some other passages which are found in Jonson's works, might
be mentioned in support of this observation, but being quoted
hereafter for other purposes, they are here omitted.

Notwithstanding these proofs, Jonson's malevolence to Shak-
speare, and jealousy of his superior reputation, have been doubted
by Mr. Pope and others : and much stress has been laid on a
passage in his Discoveries, and on the commendatory verses pre-
fixed to the first edition of our author's plays in folio. — The
reader, after having perused the following character of Jonson,
drawn by Mr. Drummond of Hawthornden, a contemporary, and
an intimate acquaintance of his, will not, perhaps, readily believe
these posthumous encomiums to have been sincere, *' Ben Jon-
son," says that writer, ** was a great lover and praiser of him-
self ; a contemner and scorner of others ; given rather to lose a

* ** Ah ! ma mere, s'ecrie-t-il, il y a un gros rat derriere la
tapisserie ; — il tire son epee, court au rat, et tue le bon homme
Polonius." CEuvres de Voltaire, t. xv. p. 473, 4to.

364

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

wherein the speeches are generally enlarged, and
raised ; several whole scenes besides, and the choruses
also, were since added by Shakspeare."

Dr. Warburton also positively asserts, that this
first scene was written after the accession of King

friend than a jest ; jealous of every word and action of those
about him, especially after drink, which is one of the elements in
which he lived; a dissembler of the parts which reign in him ; a
bragger of some good that he wanted ; thinketh nothing well
done, but what either he himself or some of his friends have said or
done ; he is passionately kind and angry ; careless either to gain
or keep ; vindictive, but if he be well answered, [angry] at him-
self ; interprets best sayings and deeds often to the worst * . He"
was for any religion, as being versed in both ; oppressed with fancy,
which over-mastered his reason, a general disease in many poets.
His inventions are smooth and easy, but above all, he excelleth in
translation." Druminond^ s Works, fol. 1711 ; p. 226.

In the year 1619 Jonson went to Scotland, to visit Mr. Drum-
mond, who has left a curious account of a conversation that
passed between them, relative to the principal poets of those
times.

[I have already stated that, in superintending Mr. Malone's work
in its passage through the press, I did not feel justified in with-
drawing any of his opinions, however erroneous I might think
them, unless where I was authorized, either by his papers, or by
something which I might have collected from him in conversation.
I have, therefore, suffered this note to remain as it was originally
written; although, at the same time, I do not hesitate to express
my conviction that the charge against Jonson, which it contains,
has been satisfactorily answered by Mr. Gifford. With this
avowal, to prevent my being misunderstood, I quit a most
unpleasing topick. Boswell.]

* His misquoting a line of Julius Csesar, so as to render it
nonsense, at a time when the play was in print, is a strong illus-
tration of this part of his character. The plea of an unfaithful
memory cannot be urged in his defence, for he tells us in his
Discoveries, that till he was past forty, he could repeat every thing
that he had written.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

365

James L; and the subsequent editors agree, that
several additions were made by the author to King
Henry V. after it was originally composed. But
there is, I believe, no good ground for these asser-
tions. It is true, that no perfect edition of this play
was published before that in folio, in 1623 ; but it
does not follow from thence, that the scenes which
then first appeared in print, and all the choruses,
were added by Shakspeare, as Mr. Pope supposes,
after 1608. We know, indeed, the contrary to be
true ; for the Chorus to the fifth Act must have been
written in 1599.

The fair inference to be drawn from the imperfect
and mutilated copies of this play, published in
1600, 1602, and 1608, is, not that the whole play,
as we now have it, did not then exist, but that those
copies were surreptitious ; and that the editor in
1600, not being able to pubHsh the whole, published
what he could.

I have not, indeed, met with any evidence (except
in three plays) that the several scenes which are found
in the folio of 1623, and are not in the preceding
quartos, were added by the second labour of the
author. — The last chorus of King Henry V. already
mentioned, affords a striking proof that this was not
always the case. The two copies of The Second
Part of King Henry IV. printed in the same year
(1600), furnish another. In one of these, the whole
first scene of Act HI. is wanting ; not because it was
then unwritten (for it is found in the other copy pub-
lished in that year), but because the editor was not
possessed of it. That what have been called addU

366 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

tions by the author, were not really such, may be
also collected from another circumstance ; that in
some of the quartos where these supposed additions
are wanting, references and replies are found to the
passages omitted^.

I do not, however, mean to say, that Shakspeare
never made any alterations in his plays. We have
reason to believe that Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet,
and The Merry Wives of Windsor, were revised and
augmented by the author ; and a second revisal, or
temporary topicks, might have suggested, in a course
of years, some additions and alterations in some other
of his pieces. But with respect to the entire scenes
that are wanting in some of the early editions (par-
ticularly those of King Henry V. King Richard II.
and The Second Part of King Henry IV.), I sup-
pose the omissions to have arisen from the imper-
fection of the copies; and instead of saying that
" the first scene of King Henry V. was added by the
author after the publication of the quarto in 1600,"
all that we can pronounce with certainty is, that this
scene is not found in the quarto of 1600.

16. Js You Like It, 1599.
This comedy was not printed till 1623, and the

8 Of this see a remarkable instance in King Henry IV.
Part II. Act I. Sc. I. where Morton in a long speech having in-
formed Northumberland that the Archbishop of York had joined
the rebel party, the Earl replies, — *' I knew of this before." The
quarto contains the reply, but not a single line of the narrative ta
which it relates.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 367

caveat or memorandum^ in the second volume of
the books of the Stationers' Company, relative to
the three plays of As You Like It, Henry V. and
Much Ado About Nothing, has no date except Aug. 4.
But immediately aboxie that caveat there is an entry,
dated May 27, 1600, — and the entry immediately
fo I lozving it, is dated Jan. 23, 1603. We may there-
fore presume that this caveat was entered between
those two periods ; more especially, as the dates scat-
tered over the pages where this entry is found, are,
except in one instance, in a regular series from 1596
to 1615. This will appear more clearly by exhibiting
the entry exactly as it stands in the book :

27 May, 1600.
To Mr. Roberts.] Allarum to London.

4 Aug.
As You Like It, a book.
Henry the Fift, a book.
Every Man in his Humour, a book.
Comedy of Much Ado about Nothing.

23 Jan. 1603.
To Thomas Thorpe, 1 ^, . . , .
and WiUiam Aspley, } *° ^^^P^'

It is extremely probable that this 4th of August
was of the year 1600 ; which standing a little higher
on the paper, the Clerk of the Stationers' Company
might have thought unnecessary to be repeated. All
the plays which were entered with As You Like It,

9 See Mr. Steevens's extracts from the books of the Stationers'
Company, in a subsequent part of this volume.
7

to be
staied.

368

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

and are here said to be staled, were printed in the
year 1600 or 1601. The stay or injunction against
the printing appears to have heen very speedily
taken off ; for in ten days afterwards, on the 14th of
August, 1600, King Henry V. was entered, and
published in the same year. So, Much Ado about
Nothing was entered August 23, 1600, and printed
also in that year : and Every Man in his Humour
was published in 1601.

Shakspeare, it is said, played the part of Adam in
As You Like It. As he was not eminent on the
stage, it is probable that he ceased to act some years
before he retired to the country. His appearance,
however, in this comedy, is not inconsistent with the
date here assigned ; for we know that he performed
a part in Jonson's Sejanus in 1603.

A passage in this comedy furnishes an additional
proof of its not having been written before the year
1596, nor after the year 1603. " I will weep for
nothing," says Rosalind, " like Diana in the foun-
tain'' Stowe, in his Survey of London, 1598, in-
forms us, that in the year 1598, at the east side of
the Cross in Cheapside was set up " a curious wrought
tabernacle of gray marble, and in the same an ala-
baster image of Diana, and water conveyed from the
Thames, prilling from her naked breast." To this
the passage above cited certainly alludes. In his
second edition of the same work, printed in 1603, he
informs the reader, that the water flowed in this
manner for a time, but that the statue was then
decayed. It was, we see, in order in 1598, and con-
tinued so vdthout doubt for a year afterwards, that

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 369

is, till 1599, when As You Like It appears to have
been written.

In this comedy a line of Marlowe's Hero and
Leander is quoted. That poem was published in
1598, and probably before.

17. Much Ado About Nothing, 1600.

Much Ado About Nothing was written, we may
presume, early in the year 1600 ; for it was entered
at Stationers' Hall, August 23, 1600, and printed
in that year.

It is not mentioned by Meres in his list of our
author's plays, published in the latter end of the year
1598.

18. Hamlet, 1600.

In a former edition of this Essay I was induced to
suppose that Hamlet must have been written prior to
1598, from the loose manner in which Mr. Steevens
has mentioned a manuscript note by Gabriel Harvey
in a copy, which had belonged to him, of Speght's
edition of Chaucer, in which, we are told, he has set
down Hamlet as a performance with which he was well
acquainted in the year 1598. See vol. vii. p. 168.
But I have been favoured by the Bishop of Dromore
[Dr. Percy], the possessor of the book referred to,
with an inspection of it ; and, on an attentive exami-
nation, I have found reason to believe, that the note
in question may have been written in the latter end
of the year 1600. Harvey doubtless purchased this
volume in 1598, having, both at the beginning and
end of it, written his name. But it by no means

VOL. ir. 2 B

370 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

follows that all the intermediate remarks which are
scattered throughout were put down at the same
time. He speaks of translated Tasso in one passage ;
and the first edition of Fairfax, which is doubtless
alluded to, appeared in 1600. There can be very
little doubt that Hamlet was first performed in the
autumn of that year, from the reference which is
made in it to the " inhibition of the players " which
comes by means of the late innovation. All the
theatres except the Fortune and the Globe were in-
hibited by an Order of Council in June, 1600, printed
by Mr. Chalmers ^ ; and so the other city tragedians
were forced to travel. This order arose probably
from the licentiousness of the children of Panics,
who indulged in personal allusion, and were tyran-
nically clapped for it.

The following passage is found in an Epistle to
the Gentlemen Students of the Two Universities, by
Thomas Nashe, prefixed to Greene's Arcadia, which
was published in 1589 : "I will turn back to my
first text of studies of delight, and talk a little in
friendship with a few of our trivial translators. It is
a common practice now a-days, among a sort of shift-
ing companions, that runne through every art, and
thrive by none, to leave the trade of Noverint \

4 See vol. iii. p. 453.

^ " The country lawyers too jog down apace.
Each with his noverint universi ftice."
Ravenscrqft's Prologue prefixed to Titus Andronicus.
Our ancient deeds were written in Latin, and frequently began
with the words, Noverint Universi. The form is still retained.
Know all men, &c.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 371

whereto they were born, and busie themselves with
the endevors of art, that could scarcely latinize their
neck-verse if they should have neede ; yet English
Seneca, read by candle-light, yeelds many good sen-
tences, as Bloud is a beggar, and so forth : and, if
you intreat him faire in a frosty morning, he will
affoord you whole Hamlets, I should say, Handfuls,
of tragical speeches. But O grief ! T empus eda.v
reruyn ; — what is it that will last always ? The
sea exhaled by drops will in continuance be drie ;
and Seneca, let bloud line by line, and page by page,
at length must needes die to our stage."

Not having seen the first edition of this tract till a
few years ago, I formerly doubted whether the fore-
going passage referred to the tragedy of Hamlet ;
but the word Hamlets being printed in the original
copy in a different character from the rest, I have no
longer any doubt upon the subject.

It is manifest from this passage that some play on
the story of Hamlet had been exhibited before the
year 1589 ; but I am inclined to think that it was
not Shakspeare's drama, but an elder performance,
on which, with the aid of the old prose History of
Hamlet, his tragedy was formed. The great number
of pieces which we knoxv he formed on the perform-
ances of preceding writers ^ renders it highly pro-
bable that some others also of his dramas were con-
structed on plays that are now lost. Perhaps the

^ See the Dissertation on the Three Parts of King Henry VI.
vol.xvii.

2 B 2

372

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

original Hamlet was written by Thomas Kyd : who
was the author of one play (and probably of more)
to which no name is affixed The only tragedy to
which Kyd's name is affixed (Cornelia), is a pro-
fessed translation from the French of Garnier, who,
as well as his translator, imitated Seneca. In Kyd's
Spanish Tragedy, as in Shakspeare's Hamlet, there
is, if I may say so, a play represented within a
play : if the old play of Hamlet should ever be reco-
vered, a similar interlude, I make no doubt, would be
found there ; and somewhat of the same contrivance
may be traced in The old Taming of a Shrew, a
comedy which perhaps had the same author as the
other ancient pieces now enumerated.

Nashe seems to point at some dramatick writer of
that time, who had originally been a scrivener or
attorney :

** A clerk foredoom'd his father's soul to cross,

** Who penned a stanza when he should engross ; "

who, instead of transcribing deeds and pleadings,
chose to imitate Seneca's plays, of which a translation
had been published many years before. Our author,
however freely he may have borrowed from Plutarch
and Holinshed, does not appear to be at all indebted
to Seneca ; and therefore I do not believe that he was
the person in Nashe's contemplation.

The tragedy of Hamlet was not registered in the
books of the Stationers' Company till the 26th of

7 The Spanish Tragedy.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 373

July, 1602. I believe it was then published, though
the earliest copy now extant is dated in 1604. In
the title-page of that copy, the play is said to be
" nexdy imprinted, and enlarged to almost as much
again as it was, according to the true and perfect
copy from which words it is manifest that a former
less perfect copy had been issued from the press.

In a tract entitled Wits Miserie or the World's
Madnesse, discovering the incarnate Devils of the
Age, by Thomas Lodge, which was published in
quarto in 1596, one of the devils (as Dr. Farmer has
observed) is said to be " a foule lubber, and looks as
pale as the vizard of the ghost, who cried so miser-
ably at the theatre, Hamlet, revenge'' If the allu-
sion was to our author's tragedy, this passage will
ascertain its appearance in or before 1596 ; but Lodge
must have had the elder play in his contemplation.

19. Merry Wives of Windsor, 1601.

The following line in the earliest edition of this
comedy,

" Sail like my pinnace to those golden shores,"

shows that it was written after Sir Walter Raleigh's
return from Guiana in 1596.

The first sketch of The Merry Wives of Windsor
was printed in 1602. It was entered in the books of
the Stationers' Company on the 18th of January,
1601-2, and was therefore probably written in 1601,
after the two parts of King Henry IV. being, it is
said, composed at the desire of Queen Elizabeth, in

374

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

order to exhibit Falstaff in love, when all the plea-
santry which he could afford in any other situation
was exhausted. But it may not be thought so clear,
that it was written after King Henry V. Nym andBar-
dolph are both hanged in King Henry V. yet appear
in The Merry Wives of Windsor. Falstaff is dis-
graced in The Second Part of King Henry IV. and
dies in King Henry V. ; but in The Merry Wives
of Windsor, he talks as if he were yet in favour at
court ^ ; "If it should come to the ear of the court
how I have been transformed," &c. : and Mr. Page
discountenances Fenton's addresses to his daughter
because he kept company with the wild Prince and
ivith Pointz. These circumstances seem to favour
the supposition that this play was written between
the First and Second Parts of King Henry IV. But
that it was not written then, may be collected from
the tradition above mentioned. The truth, I believe,
is, that though it ought to be read (as Dr. Johnson
has observed) between The Second Part of King
Henry IV. and King Henry V. it was written after
King Henry V. and after Shakspeare had killed
Falstaff. In obedience to the royal commands, having
revived him, he found it necessary at the same time
to revive all those persons with whom he was wont to
be exhibited ; Nym, Pistol, Bardolph, and the Page :
and disposed of them as he found it convenient,
without a strict regard to their situations, or catas-
trophes in former plays.

* ** Well, an the fine wits of the Court heare this theyle so
whip me," &c. 4<to. 1602.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

375

There is reason to believe that The Merry Wives
of Windsor was revised and enlarged by the author,
after its first production. The old edition in 1602,
like that of Romeo and Juliet, is apparently a rough
draught, and not a mutilated or imperfect copy "^.
The precise time v^hen the alterations and additions
were made, has not been ascertained : however, some
passages in the enlarged copy may assist us in our
conjectures on the subject.

FalstafF's address to Justice Shallow in the first
scene shows that the alterations were made after
King James came to the throne : " Now, Master
Shallow, you'll complain of me to the king'' In
the first copy the words are, " to the council''

When Mrs. Page observes to Mrs. Ford, that
" these knights will hack," which words are not in
the original copy, Shakspeare, it has been thought,
meant to convey a covert sneer at King James's pro-
digality in bestowing knighthood in the beginning of
his reign. Between the king's arrival at Berwick and

* Mr. Boaden dissents from this opinion ; and contends that the
chasms which sometimes occur in the story of this drama as it
appears in the early quarto, point out that copy as one which was
imperfectly taken down during the representation. As an in-
stance of this he points out a passage in Act I. Sc. IV. where Dr.
Caius says " Sir Hugh send a you ? " and upon that, determines to
send him a challenge ; in the folio, Mrs. Quickly had before told
him that Simple had come with a message from Parson Hugh ;
but this piece of information being omitted in the first edition,
the doctor's anger against the parson is rendered unintelligible.
Yet this may have proceeded from the carelessness of the author
himself; let the reader judge. Boswell.

376 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

the 2d of May, 1603, he made 237 knights ; and in
the following July near four hundred.

" The best courtier of them all," says Mrs.
Quickly, " when the court lay at Windsor, could
never have brought her to such a canary. Yet there
have been knights, and lords, and gentlemen, with
their coaches, I warrant you, coach after coach," &c.

The court went to Windsor in the beginning of
July, 1603, and soon afterwards the feast of Saint
George was celebrated there with great solemnity.
The Prince of Wales, the Duke of Lenox, oiu*
poet's great patron the Earl of Southampton, the
Earl of Pembroke, and the Earl of Marre, were
installed knights of the garter ; and the chief ladies
of England did homage to the queen. The king
and queen afterwards usually resided in the summer
at Greenwich. The allusion to the insignia of the
order of the garter in the fifth Act of this comedy,
if written recently after so splendid a solemnity,
would have a peculiar grace ; yet the order having
been originally instituted at Windsor by King
Edward III. the place in which the scene lay,
might, it must be owned, have suggested an allusion
to it, without any particular or temporary object. —
It is observable that Mrs. Quickly says, there had
been knights, lords, and gentlemen, with their
coaches, coach after coach, &c. Coaches, as appears
from Howes's Continuation of Stowe's Chronicle, did
not come into general use, till the year 1605. It
may therefore be presumed, that this play was not
enlarged very long before that year.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 377

There is yet another note of time to be considered.
In the first scene of the enlarged copy of The Merry
Wives of Windsor, Slender asks Mr. Page, " How
does your fallow greyhound, sir? I hear he was outrun
on Cotsale." He means the Cotswold hills in Glouces-
tershire. In the beginning of the reign of James the
First, the Cotswold games were instituted by one
Dover. They consisted, as Mr. Warton has observed
of " wrestling, leaping, pitching the bar, handling
the pike, dancing of women, various kinds of hunt-
ing, and particularly coursing the hare with grey-
hounds." Mr. Warton is of opinion, that two or
three years must have elapsed before these games
could have been effectually established, and therefore
supposes that our author's additions to this comedy
were made about the year 1607. Dr. Farmer
doubts whether Capt. Dover was the founder of these
games. " Though the Captain," he observes, " be
celebrated in the Annalia Dubrensia as the founder
of them, he might be the reviver only, or some way
contribute to make them more famous ; for in the
second part of King Henry IV. Justice Shallow
reckons among the swinge-bucklers, " Will Squeele,
a Cotsole man." In confirmation of Dr. Farmer's
opinion, Mr. Steevens remarks, that in Randolph's
poems, 1638, is found An eclogue on the noble
assemblies revived on Cotswold hills by Mr. Robert
Dover."

If the Cotswold games were celebrated before the
death of Queen Elizabeth, the passage above cited
certainly proves nothing. Let us then endeavour to

378 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

ascertain that fact. Dover himself tells us in the
Annalia Dubrensia that he was the founder of these
games :

*' Yet I was bold for better recreation

" To invent these sports, to counter-check that fashion : "

and from Ben Jonson's verses in the same collection
we learn that they were exhibited in the time of
James I. and revived in 1636. Nothing more then
follows from Randolph's verses, compared with
Jonson's, than that the games had been discontinued
after their first institution by Dover (probably soon
after the death of King James), and were revived
by their founder at a subsequent period. Cotswold,
long before the death of Elizabeth, might have been
famous for swinge bucklers, or in other words for
strong men, skilled in fighting with sword and
buckler, wrestling, and other athletick exercises :
but there is no ground for supposing that coursing
with greyhounds, in order to obtain the prize of a
silver collar, was customary there, till Dover insti-
tuted those prizes after the accession of James to the
throne.

That they were instituted about the year 1603,
when King James acceded to the English throne,
may be collected from the account given of them
by Wood, in his Athen. Oxon. vol. ii. p. 812 :
" The said games were begun, and continued at a
certain time of the year, for 40 years, by one Robert
Dover, an attorney of Burton on the heath in War-
wickshire ; who did, with leave from King James I.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 379

select a place on Cotswold-hills in Glocestershire,
whereon those games should be acted. Dover was
constantly there in person, well mounted and accou-
tred, and was the chief director and manager of
those games, even till the rascally rebellion was
begun by the Presbyterians, which gave a stop to
their proceedings, and spoiled all that was generous
and ingenious elsewhere."

This comedy was not printed in its present state
till 1623, when it was published with the rest of
our author's plays in folio. The republication of
the imperfect copy in 1619 has been mentioned as a
circumstance from which we may infer that Shak-
speare's improved play was not written, or at least
not acted, till some years after 1607. I confess, I
do not perceive, on what ground this inference is
made. Arthur Johnson, the bookseller for whom the
imperfect copy of this play was published in 1602,
when the whole edition was sold off, reprinted it in
1619, knowing that the enlarged copy remained in
MS. in the hands of the proprietors of the Globe
theatre, and that such of the publick as wished to
read the play in any form, must read the imperfect
play, of which he had secured the property by enter-
ing it at Stationers' Hall. In the same manner
Thomas Pavier in 1619 reprinted the first and second
parts of The Whole Contention of the Two Houses
of Yorke and Lancaster, though he could not but
know that the Second and Third Parts of King
Henry VI. which were formed on those pieces, and
were much more valuable than them, had been fre-

380 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

quently acted, antecedent to his republication, and
that the original plays had long been withdrawn from
the scene. Not being able to procure the improved
and perfect copies, a needy bookseller would publish
what he could.

20, Troilus and Cressida, 1602.

Troilus and Cressida was entered at Stationers'
Hall, Feb. 7, 1602-3, under the title of The booke
of Troilus and Cressida, by J. Roberts, the printer of
Hamlet, The Merchant of Venice, and A Mid-
summer-Night's Dream. It was therefore, probably,
written in 1602. It was printed in 1609, with the
title of The History of Troylus and Cressida, with
a preface by the editor, who speaks of it as if it
had not been then acted. But it is entered in
1602-3, " as acted by my Lord Chamberlen's men."
The players at the Globe theatre, to which Shak-
speare belonged, were called the Lord Chamherleris
servants, till the year 1603. In that year they
obtained a licence for their exhibitions from King
James ; and from that time they bore the more
honourable appellation of his majesty's sergeants.
There can, therefore, be little doubt, that the
Troilus and Cressida which is here entered, as acted
at Shakspeare's theatre, was his play, and was, if
not represented, intended to have been represented
there.

Perhaps the two discordant accounts, relative to
this piece, may be thus reconciled. It might have
been performed in 1602 at court, by the lord cham-

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 381

berlain's servants (as many plays at that time were),
and yet not have been exhibited on the publick stage
till some years afterwards. The editor in 1609 only
says, " it had never been staled with the stage, never
clapper-claw'd with the palms of the vulgar^

As a further proof of the early appearance of
Troilus and Cressida, it may be observed, that an
incident in it seems to be burlesqued in a comedy
entitled Histriomastix, which, though not printed
till 1610, must have been written before the death
of Queen Elizabeth, who, in the last Act of the
piece, is shadowed under the character of Astraea,
and is spoken of as then living.

In our author's play, when Troilus and Cressida
part, he gives her his sleeve, and she, in return, pre-
sents him with her glove.

To this circumstance these lines in Histriomastix
seem to refer. They are spoken by Troilus and
Cressida, who are introduced in an interlude :

" Troi. Come, Cressida, my cresset light,
*' Thy face doth shine both day and night.
*' Behold, behold, thy garter blue
*' Thy hnight his valiant elbouo iveares,
*' That, when he shakes his furious speare,
** The foe in shivering fearful sort

May lay him down in death to snort.

" Cress. O knight, with valour in thy face,
*' Here take my skreene, weare it for grace ;
** Within thy helmet put the same,
" Therewith to make thy enemies lame."

In Much Ado About Nothing, Troilus is mentioned
as " the first employer of pandars." Shakspeare,

382

LIFE OF SHAK^PEARE.

therefore, probably had read Chaucer's poem before
the year 1600, when that play was printed.
In Cymbeline it is said, that

•* Thersites' body is as good as Ajax',
'* When neither are alive."

This seems to import a precedent knowledge of
Ajax and Thersites, and in this light may be re-
garded as a presumptive proof that Troilus and
Cressida was written before Cymbeline.

Dryden supposed Troilus and Cressida to have
been one of Shakspeare's earliest performances ^ ; but
has not mentioned on what principles he founded his
judgment. Pope, on the other hand, thought it one
of his last ; grounding his opinion not only on
the preface by the editor in 1609, but on " the
great number of observations both moral and poli-
tical with which this piece is crouded, more than
any other of our author's." For my own part, were
it not for the entry in the Stationers' books, I should
have been led, both by the colour of the writing, and
by the above-mentioned preface, to class it (though
not one of our author's happiest effusions) in 1608,
rather than in that year in which it is here placed.

Yet, after all, I may still be mistaken. It appears

3 '* The tragedy which I have undertaken to correct, was in
all probability one of his first endeavours on the stage. — Shak-
speare (as I hinted) in the apprenticeship of his uoriting modelled
it [the story of Lollius] into that play which is now called by the
name of Troilus and Cressida." — Dryden' s Pref. to Troilus and
Cressida.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 383

from Henslowe's MSS. vol iii. p. 331, that a play
upon the subject of Troilus and Cressida had been
written by Dekker and Chettle in 1599 ; and this
elder drama may have been the object of satire in
Histriomastix.

24. Measure for Measure^ 1603.

This play was not registered at Stationers' Hall,
nor printed, till 1623. But from two passages in
it, which seem intended as a courtly apology for the
stately and ungracious demeanour of King James I.
on his entry into England, it appears probable that
it was written not long after his accession to the
throne :

I'll privily away. I love the people,
*' But do not like to stage me to their eyes.
" Though it do well, I do not relish well
** Their loud applause, and aves vehement ;
*' Nor do I think the man of safe discretion
*' That does affect it." Measure for Measure, Act I. Sc. I.

Again, Act II. Sc. IV. :

" The general, subject to a well-wish'd king,
*' Quit their own part, and in obsequious fondness
'* Croud to his presence, where their untaught love
*' Must needs appear offence 4."

King James was so much offended by the untaught,
and, we may add, undeserved, gratulations of his
subjects, on his entry into England, that he issued a
proclamation, forbidding the people to resort to him.

4 See Mr. Tyrwhitt's note.

384 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

— " Afterwards," says the historian of his reign,
" in his publick appearances, especially in his sports,
the accesses of the people made him so impatient,
that he often dispersed them with frowns, that we
may not say with curses

It is observable throughout our author's plays
that he does not scruple to introduce English signs,
habits, customs, names, &c. though the scene of his
drama lies in a foreign country ; and that he has
frequent allusions to the circumstances of the day,
though the events which form the subject of his piece
are supposed to have happened a thousand years
before. Thus, in Coriolanus, Hob and Dick are
plebeians ; and the Romans toss their caps in the
air, with the same expressions of festivity which
our poet's contemporaries displayed in Stratford or
London. In Twelfth-Night we hear of the bed of
Ware, and the bells of Saint Bennet ; and in The
Taming of the Shrew the Pegasus, a sign of a pub-
lick house in Cheapside in the time of Queen Eliza-
beth, is hung up in a town in Italy. In Hamlet the
Prince of Denmark and Guildenstern hold a long con-
versation concerning the children of the Chapel and
St. Pauls. The opening of the present play, viewed
in this light, furnishes an additional argument in
support of the date which I have assigned to it.
When King James came to the throne of England,
March 24, 1602-3, he found the kingdom engaged in
a war with Spain, which had lasted near twenty
years. " Heaven grant us his peace ! " says a gen-

5 Wilson's History of King James, ad ann. 1603.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

385

tleman to Lucio, Act I. 8c. IL ; and afterwards the
bawd laments, that " what with the xvar, what with
the sweat, she was custom-shrunk." Supposing these
two passages to relate to our author's own time, they
almost decisively prove Measure for Measure to have
been written in 1603 ; when the war was not yet
ended, as the latter words seem to imply, and when
there was some prospect of peace, as the former seem
to intimate. Our British Solomon very soon after his
accession to the throne manifested his pacifick dispo-
sition, though the peace with Spain was not pro-
claimed till the 19th of August, 1604.

By the sweat, considering who the speaker is, it
is probable that the disorder most fatal to those of
her profession was intended. However, the plague
was sometimes so called ; and perhaps the dreadful
pestilence of 1603 was meant ; which carried off in
the month of July in that year 857 persons, and
in the whole year 30,578 persons : that is, one fifth
part of the people in the metropolis ; the total
number of the inhabitants of London being at that
time about one hundred and fifty thousand. If such
was the allusion, it likewise confirms the date attri-
buted to this play.

Some part of this last argument in confirmation of
the date which I had assigned some years ago to the
comedy before us, I owe to Mr. Capell ; and while I
acknowledge the obligation, it is but just to add, that
it is the only one that I met with, which in the small-
est degree could throw any light on the present in-
quiry into the dates of our author's plays,

*' In the dry desert of ten thousand lines ; "
VOL. II. 2 c

386 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

after wading through two ponderous volumes in
quarto, written in a style manifestly formed on that
of the Clown in the comedy under our consideration,
whose narratives, we are told, were calculated to last
out a night in Russia, when nights are at the
longest.

In the year 1604, says Wilson the historian,
" the sword and buckler trade being out of date,
diverse sects of vitious persons, under the title of
roaring boys, bravadoes, r oysters, kc. commit many
insolencies ; the streets swarm night and day with
quarrels : private duels are fomented, especially be-
tween the English and Scotch : and great feuds be-
tween protestants and papists." A proclamation was
published to restrain these enormities ; which proving
ineffectual, the legislature interposed, and the act com-
monly called the statute of stabbing, 1 Jac. I. c. 8. was
made. This statute, as Sir Michael Foster observes,
was principally intended to put a stop to the outrages
above enumerated, " committed by persons of inflam-
mable spirits and deep resentment, who, wearing short
daggers under their cloaths, were too well prepared to
do quick and effectual execution upon provocations
extremely slight." King James's first parliament
met on the 19th of March, 1603-4, and sat till the
7th of July following. From the time of James's
accession to the throne great animosity subsisted be-
tween the English and Scotch ; and many of the
outrageous acts which gave rise to the statute of
stabbing, had been committed in the preceding year,
about the end of which year I suppose Measure for
Measure to have been written. The enumeration

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 387

made by the Clown, in the fourth Act, of the persons
who were confined with him in the prison, is an addi-
tional confirmation of the date assigned to it. Of
ten prisoners whom he names, four are stabbers, or
duellists : " Master Starvelacky, the rapier and
dagger man, young Drop-heir that killed lusty Pud-
ding, Master Forth-right, the tilter, and wild Half-
can that stabbed Pots."

That Measure for Measure was written before
1607, niay be fairly concluded from the following
passage in a poem published in that year, which we
have good ground to believe was copied from a
similar thought in this play, as the author, at the
end of his piece, professes a personal regard for
Shakspeare, and highly praises his Venus and
Adonis ^ ,

So play the foolish throngs with one that suooons ;
" Come all to help him, and so stop the air
" By which he should revive."

Measure for Measure^ Act IL Sc. IV.

And like as when some sudden extasie
" Seizeth the nature of a sicklie man ;
*' When he's discern'd to stuoone, straite by and by

** Folke to his helpe confusedly have ran ;
** And seeking with their art to fetch him backe,
** So many throng, that he the ayre doth lacke."

Myrrhuy the Mother of Adonis, or Luste's Prodigies,
by William Barksted, a poem, 1607.

* See the verses alluded to, in a note on the extracts from the
Stationers' Registers. This writer does not seem to have been
very scrupulous about adopting either the thoughts or expressions
of his contemporaries ; for in his poem are found two lines taken
verbatim from Marston's Insatiate Countess, printed four years
before Myrrha, the Mother of Adonis, &c. :

2 C 2

388

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

22. King Henry VIIL 1603.

This play was probably written, as Dr. Johnson
and Mr. Steevens observe, partly before the death of
Queen Elizabeth, which happened on the 24th of
March, 1602-3. The elogium on King James, which
is blended with the panegyrick on Elizabeth, in
the last scene, was evidently a subsequent insertion,
after the accession of the Scottish monarch to the
throne : for Shakspeare was too well acquainted
with courts, to compliment, in the life-time of
Queen Elizabeth, her presumptive successor, of
whom history informs us she was not a little jealous.
That the prediction concerning King James was
added after the death of the Queen, is still more
clearly evinced, as Dr. Johnson has remarked, by the
aukward manner in which it is connected with the
foregoing and subsequent lines.

The following lines in that prediction may serve to
ascertain the time when the compliment was intro-
duced ;

" Wherever the bright sun of heaven shall shine,
" His honour and the greatness of his name
" Shall be, and make new nations."

Though Virginia was discovered in 1584, the

*' Night, like a masque, was enter'd heaven's great hall,
** With thousand torches ushering the way."
It appears from Ben Jonson's Silent Woman, that W. Barksted
was an actor, and was employed in the theatre where our author's
plays were represented. He might therefore have performed a
part in Measure for Measure, or have seen the copy before it was
printed.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 389

first colony sent out went there in 1606. In that
year the king granted two letters patent for planting
that country, one to the city of London, the other to
the cities of Bristol, Exeter, and Plymouth. The
colony sent from London, settled in Virginia ; that
from the other cities, in New England ; the capital of
which was huilt in the following year, and called
James town. In 1606 also a scheme was adopted for
the plantation of Ulster in Ireland^. I suspect,
therefore, that the panegyrick on the king was intro-
duced either in that year, or in 1612, when a lottery
was granted expressly for the establishment of English
Colonies in Virginia.

It may be objected, that if this play was written
after the accession of King James, the author could
not introduce a panegyrick on him, without making
Queen Elizabeth the vehicle of it, she being the
object immediately presented to the audience in the
last Act of King Henry VIII. : and that, therefore,
the praises so profusely lavished on her, do not prove
this play to have been written in her life-time ; on
the contrary, that the concluding lines of her cha-
racter seem to imply that she was dead, when it was
composed. The objection certainly has weight; but,
I apprehend, the following observations afford a suffi-
cient answer to it.

1. It is more likely that Shakspeare should have
written a play, the chief subject of which is, the
disgrace of Queen Catharine, the aggrandizement of
Anne Boleyn, and the birth of her daughter, in the

^ Bacon's Works, vol. iv. p. 440.

390

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

life-time of that daughter, than after her death : at
a time when the suhject must have heen highly
pleasing at court, rather than at a period when it
must have been less interesting.

Queen Catharine, it is true, is represented as an
amiable character, but still she is eclipsed ; and the
greater her merit, the higher was the compliment
to the mother of Elizabeth, to whose superior beauty
she was obliged to give way.

2. If King Henry VIII. had been written in the
time of King James I. the author, instead of expa-
tiating so largely in the last scene, in praise of the
Queen, which he could not think would be accept-
able to her successor, who hated her memory ^, would
probably have made him the principal figure in the
prophecy, and thrown her into the back-ground as
much as possible.

3. Were James I. Shakspeare's chief object in the
original construction of the last Act of this play, he
would probably have given a very short character of
Elizabeth, and have dwelt on that of James, with
whose praise he would have concluded, in order to
make the stronger impression on the audience, in-
stead of returning again to Queen Elizabeth, in a
very aukward and abrupt manner, after her character
seemed to be quite finished : an aukwardness that
can only be accounted for, by supposing the panegy-
rick on King James an after-production

3 King James on his accession to the throne studiously marked
his disregard for Elizabeth by the favour which he showed to
Lord Southampton, and to every other person who had been dis-
graced by her. Of this Shakspeare could not be ignorant.

4 After having enumerated some of the blessings which were

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 391

4. If the Queen had been dead when our author
began to write this play, he would have been ac-
quainted with the particular circumstances attending
her death, the situation of the kingdom at that time,
and of foreign states, &c. and as Archbishop Cranmer
is supposed to have had the gift of prophecy, Shak-
speare, probably, would have made him mention some
of those circumstances. Whereas the prediction, as
it stands at present, is quite general, and such as
might, without any hazard of error, have been pro-
nounced in the life-time of her Majesty ; for the

to ensue from the birth of Elizabeth, and celebrated her majesty's
various virtues, the poet thus proceeds :

*• Cran. In her days every man shall eat in safety
*' Under his own vine, what he plants, and sing
" The merry songs of peace to all his neighbours,
*' God shall be truly known ; and those about her
" From her shall read the perfect ways of honour,
" And by those claim their greatness, not by blood.
" [Nor shall this peace sleep with her ; but as when
*' The bird of wonder dies, the maiden phoenix,
*' Her ashes new-create another heir,
'* As great in admiration as herself ;
*' So shall she leave her blessedness to one, &c.

" He shall flourish,

" And, like a mountain cedar, reach his branches

** To all the plains about him :— our children's children

** Shall see this, and bless heaven.

" King. Thou speakest wonders.]

" Cran. She shall be, to the happiness of England,
"An aged princess ; many days shall see her,
*' And yet no day without a deed to crown it.
" Would I had known no more ! but she must die,
" She must, the saints must have her ; yet a virgin," &c.
The lines between crotchets are those supposed to have been
inserted by the author after the accession of King James.

392

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

principal facts that it foretells, are, that she should die
aged, and a virgin. Of the former, supposing this pre-
diction to have been written in 1602, the author
was sufficiently secure ; for she was then near seventy
years old. The latter may perhaps be thought too
delicate a subject, to have been mentioned while she
was yet living. But we may presume, it was far
from being an ungrateful topick ; for very early after
her accession to the throne, she appears to have been
proud of her maiden character ; declaring that she
was wedded to her people, and that she desired no
other inscription on her tomb, than — " Here lyeth
Elizabeth, who reigned and died a virgin Be-
sides, if Shakspeare knew, as probably most people at
that time did, that she became very solicitous about
the reputation of virginity, when her title to it was
at least equivocal, this would be an additional in-
ducement to him to compliment her on that head.

5. Granting that the latter part of the panegyrick
on EHzabeth implies that she was dead when it was
composed, it would not prove that this play was
written in the time of King James ; for these latter
lines in praise of the Queen, as well as the whole of
the compliment to the King, might have been added
after his accession to the throne, in order to bring
the speaker back to the object immediately before
him, the infant Elizabeth. And this Mr. Theobald
conjectured to have been the case. I do not, how-
ever, see any necessity for this supposition ; as there
is nothing, in my apprehension, contained in any of

5 Camden, 27. Melvil, 49.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

393

the lines in praise of the Queen, inconsistent with
the notion of the whole of the panegyrick on her
having been composed in her life-time.

In further confirmation of what has been here
advanced to show that this play was partly written
while Queen Elizabeth was yet alive, it may be
observed (to use the words of an anonymous writer
that " Shakspeare has cast the disagreeable parts of
her father's character as much into shade as possi-
ble ; that he has represented him as greatly displeased
with the grievances of his subjects, and ordering them
to be relieved ; tender and obliging [in the early part
of the play] to his queen, grateful to the cardinal,
and in the case of Cranmer, capable of distinguishing
and rewarding true merit." — " He has exerted (adds
the same author) an equal degree of complaisance, by
the amiable lights in which he has shown the mother
of Elizabeth. Anne BuUen is represented as affected
with the most tender concern for the sufferings of her
mistress, queen Catharine ; receiving the honour the
king confers on her, by making her marchioness of
Pembroke, with a graceful humility ; and more
anxious to conceal her advancement from the queen,
lest it should aggravate her sorrows, than solicitous to
penetrate into the meaning of so extraordinary a
favour, or of indulging herself in the flattering
prospect of future royalty."

It is unnecessary to quote particular passages in
support of these assertions ; but the following lines,
which are spoken of Anne Boleyn by the Lord Cham-
berlain, appear to me so evidently calculated for the

^ The author of Shakspeare Illustrated. [Mrs. Lennox.]

394

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

ear of Elizabetji (to whom such incense was by no
means displeasing), that I cannot forbear to transcribe
them :

" She is a gallant creature, and complete
** In mind and feature. I persuade me, from her
*' Will fall some blessing to this land, 'which shall
*' In it be memorized.**

Again :

" 1 have perus'd her well ;

" Beauty and honour are in her so mingled,

*^ That they have caught the king : a)id uo/io knom i/et,

** But from this lady may proceed a gem,

" To lighten all this isle.''

Our author had produced so many plays in the
preceding years, that it is not likely that King
Henry VIII. was written before 1603. It might
perhaps with equal propriety be ascribed to 1602, and
it is not easy to determine in which of those years it
was composed ; but it is extremely probable that it
was written in one of them. It was not printed till
1623.

A poem, called The Life and Death of Thomas
Wolsey, Cardinal, which was entered on the books
of the Stationers' Company, and published, in the
year 1599, perhaps suggested this subject to Shak-
speare.

He had also certainly read Churchyard's Legend
of Cardinal Wolsey, printed in The Mirrovu* for
Magistrates, 1587.

" Have we some strange Indian with the great
tool come to court, the women so besiege us," says
the Porter in the last Act of this play. This note

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 395

of time may perhaps hereafter serve to ascertain the
date of this piece, though I cannot avail myself of it,
not having been able to discover to what circum-
stance Shakspeare here alludes.

Rowley's King Henry VIII. was published in
1605, probably with a view that it also might be
confounded with Shakspeare's drama ; and both it
and Lord Cromwell were re-printed with the same
fraudulent intention in 1613, in which year our
author's play was revived with great splendour.

The Globe play-house, we are told by the conti-
nuator of Stowe's Chronicle, was burnt down, on
St. Peter's day, in the year 1613, while the play
of King Henry VIII. was exhibiting. Sir Henry
Wotton (as Mr. Tyrwhitt has observed) says,
in one of his letters, that this accident happened
during the exhibition of a new play, called All is
True ; which, however, appears both from Sir Henry's
minute description of the piece, and from the account
given by Stowe's continuator, to have been our
author's play of King Henry VIII. If indeed Sir
H. Wotton was accurate in calling it a nexv play, all
the foregoing reasoning on this subject would be at
once overthrown ; and this piece, instead of being
ascribed to 1603, should have been placed ten
years later. But I strongly suspect that the only
novelty attending this play, in the year 1613, was
its title, decorations, and perhaps the prologue and
epilogue. The Elector Palatine was in London in
that year ; and it appears from the MS. register of
Lord Harrington, treasurer of the chambers to King
James I. that many of our author's plays were then

396

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

exhibited for the entertainment of him and the prin-
cess Ehzabeth. By the same register we learn, that
the titles of many of them were changed ^ in that
year. Princes are fond of opportunities to display
their magnificence before strangers of distinction;
and James, who on his arrival here must have been
dazzled by a splendour foreign to the poverty of his
native kingdom, might have been peculiarly ambi-
tious to exhibit before his son-in-law the mimick pomp
of an English coronation ^. King Henry VIII. there-
fore, after having lain by for some years unacted, on
account of the costliness of the exhibition, might have
been revived in 1613, under the title of All is True,
with new decorations, and a new prologue and epi-
logue. Mr. Tyrwhitt observes, that the prologue has
two or three direct references to this title ; a circum-
stance which authorizes us to conclude, almost with
certainty, that it was an occasional production, written
some years after the composition of the play. King
Henry VIII. not being then printed, the fallacy of
calling it a new play on its revival was not easily
detected.

7 Thus, Henry IV. Part I. was called Hotspur ; Henry IV.
Part II. or The Merry Wives of Windsor, was exhibited under
the name of Sir John Falstaff ; Much Ado about Nothing was new-
named Benedick and Beatrix ; and Julius Csesar seems to have
been represented under the title of Caesar's Tragedy.

^ The Prince Palatine was not present at the representation of
King Henry VIII. on the 30th of June O. S. when the Globe
playhouse was burnt down, having left England some time before.
But the play might have been revived for his entertainment in the
beginning of the year 1613; and might have been occasionally
represented afterwards.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 397

Dr. Johnson long since suspected, from the con-
temptuous manner in which " the noise of targets,
and the fellow in a long motley coat," or in other
words, most of our author's plays are spoken of, in
this prologue, that it was not the composition of
Shakspeare, but written after his departure from the
stage, on some accidental revival of King Henry VI I L
by Ben Jonson, whose style, it seemed to him to
resemble ^. Dr. Farmer is of the same opinion, and

9 In support of this conjecture it may be observed, that Ben
Jonson has in many places endeavoured to ridicule our author for
representing battles on the stage. So, in his prologue to Every
Man in his Humour ;

" — Yet ours, for want, hath not so lov'd the stage,

" As he dare serve the ill customs of the age ;

" Or purchase your delight at such a rate,

*' As, for it, he himself must justly hate ;

*' To make, &c.

" — or with three rusty swords,

" And help of some few foot-and-half-foot words,
** Fight over York and Lancaster's long jars,
*• And in the tyring house bring wounds to scars."
Again, in his Silent Woman, Act IV. Sc. IV. :
" Nay, I would sit out a play, that were nothing but fights at
sea, drum, trumpet y and target."

We are told in the memoirs of Ben Jonson's life, that he went
to France in the year 1613. But at the time of the revival of
King Henry VIII. he either had not left England, or was then
returned ; for he was a spectator of the fire which happened a*
the Globe theatre during the representation of that piece. [See
the next note.]

It may, perhaps, seem extraordinary, that he should have
presumed to prefix this covert censure of Shakspeare to one of
his own plays. But he appears to have eagerly embraced every
opportunity of depreciating him. This occasional prologue (who-
ever was the writer of it) confirms the tradition handed down by

398

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

thinks he sees something of Jon son's hand here and
there in the dialogue also. After our author's retire-
ment to the country, Jonson was perhaps employed
to give a novelty to the piece hy a new title and pro-
logue, and to furnish the managers of the Glohe with

Rowe, that our author retired from the stage some years before
his death. Had he been at that time joined with Heminge and
Burbage in the management of the Globe theatre, he scarcely
would have suffered the lines above alluded to, to have been
spoken. In Lord Harrington's account of the money disbursed
for the plays that were exhibited by his majesty's servants in the
year 1613, before the Elector Palatine, all the payments are said
to have been made to " John Heminge, for himself and the rest
of his fellows ; " from which we may conclude that he was prin-
cipal manager. A correspondent, however, of Sir Thomas Puck-
ering's (as I learn from Mr. Tyrwhitt) in a MS. letter, preserved
in the Museum, and dated in the year 1613, calls the company at
the Globe, Bourbage's company." — Shakspeare's name stands
before either of these, in the licence granted by King James : and
had he not left London before that time, the players at the Globe
theatre, I imagine, would rather have been entitled, his company.
— The burlesque parody on the account of Falstaff's death, which
is contained in Fletcher's comedy of The Captain, acted in 1613,
and the ridicule of Hamlet's celebrated soliloquy, and of Ophelia's
death, in his Scornful Lady, which was represented about the
same time, confirm the tradition that our author had then retired
from the stage, careless of the fate of his writings, inattentive to
the illiberal attacks of his contemporaries, and negligent alike of
present and posthumous fame.

Since the above note was written, I have seen the mortgage
which is printed in a subsequent page, and was executed by
Shakspeare, in March, 1612-13. From this deed we find that he
was in London in that year; he might, however, have parted
with his property in the theatre before.

[In the notes to the Epilogue to Henry VIII. I have endeavoured
to show that in those lines no satire was directed against Shak-
speare. Bo SWELL.]

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 399

a description of the coronation ceremony, and of those
other decorations, with which, from his connection
with Inigo Jones, and his attendance at court, he was
peculiarly conversant.

The piece appears to have been revived with some
degree of splendour ; for Sir Henry Wotton gives a
very pompous account of the representation. The
unlucky accident that happened to the house during
the exhibition, was occasioned by discharging some
small pieces, called chambers, on King Henry's arrival
at Cardinal Wolsey's gate at Whitehall, one of which,
being injudiciously managed, set fire to the thatched
roof of the theatre \

» The Globe theatre (as I learn from the MSS. of Mr. Oldys)
was thatched with reeds, and had an open area in its center. This
area we may suppose to have been filled by the lowest part of
the audience, whom Shakspeare calls the groundlings. — Cham-
bers are not, like other guns, pointed horizontally, but are dis-
charged as they stand erect on their breeches. The accident
may, therefore, be easily accounted for. If these pieces were let
off behind the scenes, the paper or wadding with which their
charges were confined, would reach the thatch on the inside :
or if fixed without the walls, it might have been carried by the
wind to the top of the roof.

This accident is alluded to, in the following lines of Ben Jon-
son's Execration upon Vulcan, from which it appears, that he was
at the Globe playhouse when it was burnt ; a circumstance which
in some measure strengthens the conjecture that he was employed
on the revival of King Henry VIII. for this was not the theatre
at which his pieces were usually represented :

" Well fare the wise men yet on the Bank-side,
" My friends, the watermen ! they could provide

Against thy fury, when, to serve their needs,
" They made a Vulcan of a sheaf of reeds ;
" Whom they durst handle in their holy-day coats,
" And safely trust to dress, not burn, their boats.

400

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

The play, thus revived and new-named, was pro-
bably called in the bills of that time, a new play ;
which might have led Sir Henry Wotton to describe
it as such. And thus his account may be reconciled
with that of the other contemporary writers, as well
as with those arguments which have been here urged
in support of the early date of King Henry VIH.
Every thing has been fully stated on each side of the
question. The reader must judge.

Mr. Roderick, in his notes on our author (appended
to Mr. Edwards's Canons of Criticism), takes notice
of some peculiarities in the metre of the play before
us, viz. " that there are many more verses in it than
in any other, which end with a redundant syllable,"
— " very near two to one," — and that the " caesurae
or pauses of the verse are full as remarkable." The

" But O those reeds ! thy mere disdain of them

" Made thee beget that cruel stratagem,

*' (Which some are pleas'd to style but thy mad prank),

" Against the Globe, the glory of the Bank :

" Which, though it were the fort of the whole parish,

" Flank'd with a ditch, and forc'd out of a marish,

'* I satv, with two poor chambers taken in,

** Andraz'd; ere thought could urge this might have been.

*' See the world's ruins ! nothing but the piles

" Left, and wit since to cover it with tiles.

*' The breth'ren, they straight nois'd it out for news,

*• 'Twas verily some relick of the vStews,

*' And this a sparkle of that fire let loose,

" That was lock'd up in the Winchestrian goose,

Bred on the Bayik in time of popery,
** When Venus there maintain'd her mystery.
*' But others fell, with that conceit, by the ears,
" And cried it was a threat'ning to the bears,
" And that accursed ground, the Paris-garden,'' &c.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 40l

redundancy, &c. observed by this critick, Mr. Steevens
thinks " was rather the effect of chance, than of
design in the author ; and might have arisen either
from the neghgence of Shakspeare, who in this play
has borrowed whole scenes and speeches from Holin-
shed, whose words he was probably in too much haste
to compress into versification strictly regular and
harmonious; or from the interpolations of Ben Jon-
son, whose hand Dr. Farmer thinks he occasionally
perceives in the dialogue."

Whether Mr. Roderick's position be well founded,
is hardly worth a contest ; but the peculiarities which
he has animadverted on (if such there be), add pro-
bability to the conjecture that this piece underwent
some alterations, after it had passed out of the
hands of Shakspeare \

23. Othello, 1604.
Dr. Warburton thinks that there is in this tragedy
a satirical allusion to the institution of the order of
Baronets, which dignity was created by King James L
in the year 1611 :

' The hearts of old gave hands,

" But our new heraldry is hands, not hearts."

Othello, Act III. Sc. IV.

" Amongst their other prerogatives of honour,"
(says that commentator,) they [the new-created ba-
ronets] had an addition to their paternal arms, of an
hand gules in an escutcheon argent. And We are

* Mr. Malone formerly ascribed this play to the year 1601.
I know not upon what grounds he altered his opinion. I have
inadvertently preserved the old date in the Preliminary Remarks
to Henry VII. which I request the reader will correct as an
erratum. Boswcll.

VOL. II. 2d

402 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

not to doubt that this was the new heraldry alluded
to by our author ; by which he insinuates, ' that some
then created had hands indeed, but not hearts ; that
is, money to pay for the creation, but no virtue to
purchase the honour.' "

Such is the observation of this critick. But by
what chymistry can the sense which he has affixed
to this passage, be extracted from it ? Or is it pro-
bable, that Shakspeare, who has more than once
condescended to be the encomiast of the unworthy
founder of the order of Baronets, who had been per-
sonally honoured by a letter from his majesty, and
substantially benefitted by the royal licence granted
to him and his fellow-comedians, should have been so
impolitick, as to satirize the king, or to depreciate his
new-created dignity ?

These lines appear to me to afford an obvious
meaning, without supposing them to contain such a
multitude of allusions :

^ Of old,' (says Othello,) ' in matrimonial alliances,
the heart dictated the union of hands ; but our mo-
dern junctions are those of hands, not of hearts.'

On every marriage the arms of the wife are united
to those of the husband. This circumstance, I be-
lieve, it was, that suggested heraldry, in this place,
to our author. I know not whether a heart was ever
used as an armorial ensign, nor is it, I conceive,
necessary to inquire. It was the office of the herald
to join, or, to speak technically, to quarter the arms
of the new-married pair ^. Hence, with his usual

* " I may quarter, coz," says Slender, in The Merry Wives of
Windsor. " You may (replies Justice Shallow), by marrj/ing."

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 403

licence, Shakspeare uses heraldry for junction^ or
union in generah Thus, in his Rape of Lucrece,
the same term is employed to denote the union of
colours which constitutes a beautiful complexion :

" This heraldry in Lucrece' face was seen,
" Argued by beauty's red, and virtue's white."

This passage not affording us any assistance, we
are next to consider one in The Alchemist, by Ben
Jonson, which, if it alluded to an incident in
Othello (as Mr. Steevens seems to think it does),
would ascertain this play to have appeared before
1610, in which year The Alchemist was first acted :

" Lovexvit, Didst thou hear a cry, say'st thou?

" Neigh b. Yes, sir, like unto a man that had been
strangled an hour, and could not speak."

But I doubt whether Othello was here in Jonson's
contemplation. Old Ben generally spoke out ; and
if he had intended to sneer at the manner of Desde-
mona's death, I think, he would have taken care
that his meaning should not be missed, and would
have written — " like unto a woman,'' &c.

This tragedy was not entered on the books of the
Stationers' Company till Oct. 6, 1621, nor printed till
the following year ; but it was acted at court early in
the year 1613 ^

Emilia and Lodovico, two of the characters in
this play, are likewise two of the persons represented
in May-Day, a comedy by Chapman, first printed in
1611.

A passage in the Essays of Sir Wm. Cornwallis

I 3 MS. Vertue.

2 D 2

404

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

the younger, 1601, may have suggested to Shak-
speare the mention of the new heraldry, upon which
Dr. Warburton has put what I think a most erroneous
interpretation : " We of these later times full of a
nice curiositie mislike all the performances of our
forefathers ; we say they were honest plaine men,
but they want the capering wits of this ripe age. . . .
They had wont to give their hands and their hearts
together^ but we think it a finer grace to looke
asquint, our hand looking one way and our heart
another'' If the simile of the Pontick Sea in
Act III. Sc. III. is an allusion to Pliny, translated
by Philemon Holland in 1601, this will assist us
further in ascertaining the date of this play. We
know * it was acted in 1604, and I have therefore
placed it in that year.

24. King Lear, 1605.
The tragedy of King Lear was entered on the
books of the Stationers' Company, Nov. 26, 160T,
and is there mentioned to have been played the pre-
ceding Christmas before his majesty at Whitehall,
But this, I conjecture, was not its first exhibition.
It seems extremely probable that its first appearance
was in March or April, 1605 ; in which year the old
play of King Leir, that had been entered at Sta-
tioners' Hall in 1594, was printed by Simon Stafford,
for John Wright, who, we may presume, finding
Shakspeare's play successful, hoped to palm the

^ Mr. Malone never expresses himself at random. I therefore
lament deeply that I have not been able to discover upon w^hat
evidence he knetjo this important and decisive fact. Boswell.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 405

spurious one on the publick for his ^. The old King
Leir was entered on the Stationers' books, May 8,
1 605, as it was lately acted.

Harsnett's Declaration of Popish Impostors, from
which Shakspeare borrowed some fantastick names
of spirits, mentioned in this play, was printed in
1603. Our author's King Lear was not published
till 1608.

This play is ascertained to have been written
after the month of October, 1604, by a minute
change which Shakspeare made in a traditional line,
put into the mouth of Edgar :

** His words was still, — Fye, foh, fura,
** I smell the blood of a British man."

The old metrical saying, which is found in one of
Nashe's pamphlets, printed in 1596, and in other
books, was,

Fy, fa, fum,

I smell the blood of an EnglishmanJ^

Though a complete union of England and Scot-
land, which was projected in the first parliament that
met after James's accession to the English throne,

5 Shakspeare has copied one of the passages in this old play.
This he might have done, though we should suppose it not to
have been published till after his King Lear was written and
acted ; for the old play had been in possession of the stage for
many years before 1605 ; and without doubt he had often seen it
exhibited ; nor could he have found any difficulty in procuring a
manuscript copy of it, when he sat down to write his own tragedy
on the same subject. I suspect, however, the old play had been
published in 1594-.

406

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

was not carried into effect till a century afterwards,
the two kingdoms were united in name, and he was
proclaimed king of Great Britain, October 24, 1604,

25. All's TVell That Ends Well, 1606.
The beautiful speech of the sick King in this play
has much the air of that moral and judicious reflection
that accompanies an advanced period of life, and
bears no resemblance to Shakspeare's manner in his
earlier plays :

*' Let me not live

** After my flame lacks oil, to be the snuflf

Of younger spirits, whose apprehensive senses
" All but new things disdain : whose judgments are
*' Mere fathers of their garments ; whose constancies
" Expire before their fashions."

Another circumstance which induces me to believe
that this is a later play, than I had formerly supposed,
is the satirical mention made of the puritans, who were
the objects of King James's aversion. Sir John
Harrington says, in the Nugse Antiqua9, he was by
when his majesty disputed with Dr. Reynolds at
Hampton ; " but he rather used upbraidinges than
arguments, and told the petitioners, i, e. the puritans,
that they wanted to strip Christe again, and bid
them awaie with their snivellinge : and moreover he
wished those who would take awaie the surplice
might want linen to their own breech." In Act I.
Sc. III. the Clown says, " Though honesty be no
puritan, yet it will do no hurt : it will wear the sur-
plice of humility over the black gown of a big heart."

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 407

26. Macbeth, 1606.

Since this essay was originally written, I have
observed some notes of time in the tragedy of
Macbeth, that appear to me strongly to confirm the
date which I have assigned to it. They occur in
the Porter's speech after the murder of Duncan.
The speaker, whom Shakspeare, for the sake of in-
dulging a vein of humour and honest satire, has here
represented as the Porter of Hell ^, on hearing a vio-
lent knocking at the palace gate, exclaims, " Who's
there, in the name of Belzebub ? — Here's a farmer,
that hang'd himself on the e.vpectation of plenty.
Come in time : have napkins enough about you :
here you'll sweat."

The price of corn was then, as it is now, the great
criterion of plenty or scarcity. That in the summer
and autumn of the year 1606, there was a prospect
of plenty of corn, appears from the audit-book of the
college of Eton ; for the price of wheat in the market
of Windsor in that year, was lower than it was for
thirteen years afterwards, being thirty-three shillings
the quarter ^ In the preceding year (1605) it was

^ In Othello, written a few years before this tragedy, the
Moor, distracted with jealousy, assigns the same office to Emilia :
«« you, mistress,

** That have the office opposite to St. Peter,

*' And keep the gate of hell —
^ The Audit-book of the College of Eton is a decisive autho-
rity with respect to the price of wheat in any year, compared
with any other year, precedent or subsequent. But it must not
be inferred, from the price above given, that this was the current
or medium price of wheat in that year ; for it is the rule, at Eton,

408

LIFE OF SHAKSPEATIE.

two shillings a quarter dearer : and in the subse-
quent year (1607), three shillings a quarter dearer.
In the year 1608, wheat was sold at Windsor mar-
ket for fifty-six shillings and eight pence a quarter ;

to set down the highest price of the best wheat and malt, in the
market at Windsor, at two periods of the year, which is ascer-
tained in the most unexceptionable manner : and the rents, for
the current year, are regulated by this means ; the tenants of the
College having it in their option either to pay their rents in
wheat and malt in kind, or in money, at the said market prices.
But as these are the prices of the best wheat and malt, and the
bushel at Windsor contains nine gallons, in order to find out the
true state of the middle price of wheat or malt throughout the
kingdom, in any given year (as the author of the valuable tracts
on the corn laws, 8vo. 1765, has observed), one ninth must be
subducted for the difference of the Windsor bushel above the
statute measure ; and then one ninth more from the remainder,
for the reasons which he assigns : and if this process be observed,
it will be found that the middle price of wheat in England, in
1606, was one pound six shillings, and of malt, about fifteen
shillings. In those counties where there was a great abundance
of grain, as Hampshire, Suflolk, and Norfolk, it was probably
still lower ; for Sir Charles Cornwallis, who went to Spain as
Ambassador, in May 1605, in or about September in that year,
wrote a letter to Lord Southampton, proposing to that nobleman
to send from England 2000 quarters of wheat, and 1500 quarters
of barley, to Valadolid, where there was then a great dearth ;
and that the profit resulting from this speculation, which, he
says, would be at least 500/. should be divided between them.
This scheme, he adds, may be advantageously adopted, not only
then, but for some years to come. By the statute, 1 James I.
c. 25, corn was not allowed to be exported, except when the
price of wheat did not exceed twenty-six shillings and eight pence
the quarter, and that of barley and malt did not exceed that
of fourteen shillings. By a letter in Winwood's Memorials,
we find that a quantity of corn had been exported in the early
part of the year 1616, from Lynn in Norfolk.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 409

and in 1609, for fifty shillings. In 1606 barley and
malt were cheaper than the [preceding year, and con-
siderably cheaper than in the two years subsequent.

The following words assigned to the Porter afford
a still stronger confirmation of the date of this
tragedy : " Knock, knock : Who's there, i' the other
Devil's name? 'Faith, here's an equimcator, that
could sxvear in^th the scales, against either scale;
who committed treason enough for God's sake ; yet
could not equivocate to heaven. — O come in, equi-
mcatorT

Dr. Warburton long since observed that by " an
equivocator " was here meant " a Jesuit ;" an order
(he adds) " so troublesome to the state in Queen
Elizabeth and King James the First's time ; the
inventors of the execrable doctrine of equimcationr

If the allusion were only thus general, this passage
w^ould avail us little in settling the time when Mac-
beth was written ; but it was unquestionably much
more particular and personal : and, without doubt,
had a direct reference to the doctrine of equivocation
avowed and maintained by Henry Garnet, superior
of the order of the Jesuits in England, on his trial
for the Gunpowder Treason, on the 28th of March,
1606, and to his detestable perjury on that occasion,
or, as our author describes it, " to his swearing in
both the scales against either scale," that is, flatly
and directly contradicting himself on his oath.

This trial, at which King James himself was
present incognito, from the flagitiousness of the
crime, and the celebrity and ability of Garnet, doubts
less attracted very general notice ; and the allusion

410

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

to his gross equivocation and perjury thus recent, and
probably the common topick of discourse, must have
been instantly understood, and loudly applauded.
" A true and perfect Relation of the whole Proceed-
ings " against him and his confederates, which was
published by authority in 1606, gave to the pro-
ceedings still greater notoriety.

In a letter written by Mr. John Chamberlain to
Mr. Win wood, April 5, 1606, after mentioning that
Garnet was arraigned at Guildhall the 28th of last
month for high treason, and stating some of the
evidence, he adds, " But how far these men are to
be believed on their protestations and oaths, my Lord
Salisbury [one of the commissioners on Garnet's
trial] made known by two notable instances ; having
first shewed that by reason of their impudent slan-
ders and reports we are driven to another course than
they do [pursue] in other countrys by way of torture:
for if they dye in prison, they give out that we have
starved or tortured them to death; if they kill them-
selves, zve make them away : so that we are feign to
flatter and pamper them, and get out matters by
fair means as we can. So that by the cunning of
his keeper, Garnet being brought into a fool's para-
dise, had diverse conferences with Hall, his fellow
priest, in the Tower, which were overheard by spialls
set on purpose. With which being charged, he
stiffly denyed it ; but being still m-ged, and some
light given him that they had notice of it, he per-
sisted still, zvith protestation upon his soul and sal-
vation, that there had passed no such ifiterlocution :
till at last, being confronted with Hall, he was driven

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 411

to confess. And being now asked in this audience,
how he could solve this lewd perjurie, he answered,
" that, so long as he thought they had no proof, he
was not bound to accuse himself ; but when he saw
they had proof, he stood not long in it.' And then
fell into a large discourse defending equivocation^
with many weak and frivolous distinctions.

" The other example was of Francis Tresham ;
who in his confession having accused Garnet, and
now drawing to his end in the Tower, his wife was
permitted to have access to him ; by whose means,
(as is thought), not four hours before his death, he
wrote a letter to my lord of Salisbury, contradicting
whatsoever he had said of Garnet ; protesting before
God, to whom he was now going, and upon his soul
and salvation, that he had accused him falsely, and
that he had not seen him these sixteen years last
past. Whereas it was manifestly proved, both by
Garnet himself, Mrs. Vaux, and others, that he had
been with him in three several places this last year ;
and once not many days before the blow should have
been given. And [Garnet] being now asked what
he knew of this man, he smilingly answered, that he
thought he meant to equivocate ^a"

A few extracts from Garnet's Trial, printed by
authority, will still more clearly show, that the
perjury and equivocation of the Jesuit were here
particularly alluded to by Shakspeare.

In stating the case. Sir Edward Coke, the
Attorney-General, observed, that Catesby, fearing

^ Winwood's Mcmorhils, ii. 205.

412

LIFE OF SIIAKSPEARE.

that any of those whom he had or should take into
confederacy, being touched in conscience with the
horrour of so damnable a fact, might give it over,
and endanger the discovery of the plot, seeks to
Garnet (as being the superior of the Jesuits, and
therefore of high estimation and authority amongst
all those of the Romish religion) to have his judg-
ment and resolution in conscience concerning the
lawfulness of the fact, that thereby he might be able
to give satisfaction to any who should, in that behalf,
make doubt or scruple to go forward in that treason.
And therefore Catesby, coming to Garnet, pro-
poundeth to him the case, and asketh, whether ' for
the good and promotion of the catholick cause against
here ticks,' [or, as the poet terms it, * for God's sake,']
* the necessity of time and occasion so requiring, it
be lawful or not, amongst many nocents to destroy
and take away some innocents also ; ' to this question
Garnet advisedly and resolvedly answered, that if the
advantage were greater to the Catholick part, by
taking away some innocents, together with many
nocents, then doubtless it should be lawful to kill
and destroy them all."
Again :

Then were the two witnesses called for ; both of
them persons of good estimation, that over-heard the
interlocution between Garnet and Hall the Jesuit ;
viz. Mr. Fauset, a man learned and a justice of
peace, and Mr. Lockerson : but Mr. Fauset, being
not present, was sent for to appear ; and, in the mean
while, Mr. Lockerson, who being deposed before
Garn^!t, delivered, upon his oath, that they heard

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 413

Garnet say to Hall, ' They will charge me with my
prayer for the good success of the great action, in the
beginning of the Parliament, and with the verses
which I added to the end of my prayer :

*' Gentem auferte perfidam
" Credentium de finibus,
'* Ut Christi laudes debitas
*' Persolvamus alacriter."

" ' It is true, indeed (said Garnet), that I prayed for
the good success of that great action ; but I will tell
them that I meant it in respect of some sharper law^s,
which I feared they would then make against Catho-
licks ; and that answer will serve well enough.' "

Again :

" Garnet having protested, upon his trial, that
* When Father Greenwell made him acquainted with
the whole plot, and all the particulars of it, he was
very much distempered, and could never sleep quietly
afterwards, but sometimes prayed to God that it
should not take effect ; the Earl of Salisbury replied,
that * he should do well to speak clearly of his
devotion in that point ; for otherwise he must put
him to remember that he had confessed to the
Lords that he had offered sacrifice to God for stay of
that plot, unless it xvere for the good of the Catho-
lick cause ; and in no other fashion (said his lord-
ship) was this state beholding to you for your masses
and oblations.' "

In stating one of the points alluded to by Cham-
berlain in his Letter to Secretary Winwood, Lord
Salisbury reminded Garnet, " after the interlocution
between him and Hall, when he was called before all

414

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

the lords, and was asked, not what he said, but
whether Hall and he had conference together (de-
sirmg him not to equivocate), how stiffly he denied
it upon his soul, retracting it with so many detest-
able execrations as the Earl said, it wounded their
hearts to hear him ; and yet as soon as Hall had
confessed it, he grew ashamed, cried the lords mercy,
and said he had offended, if eguwocation did not
help him."

Here certainly we have abundant proofs of " an
equivocator that could swear in both the scales against
either scale, who committed treason enough for
God's sake, and yet could not equivocate to heaven."

If these observations should be acknowledged to
be just, and yet it should be maintained that in strict
reasoning they only prove that the tragedy of
Macbeth was written subsequently to the trial of
Garnet, it may be remarked, that allusions and
references of this kind are generally made while the
facts are yet recent in the minds of the writer and
the audience, and before their impression has been
weakened by subsequent events. When, therefore,
we advert to the otlier circumstances which have in-
duced m.e to refer this tragedy to the year 1606,
this allusion, aided and supported as it is by their
concurring circumstances, appears to me to furnish a
strong confirmation of the date which has been
assigned to it.

The third circumstance mentioned by the Porter
is that of " an English tailor stealing out of a French
hose;" the humour of which, as Dr. Warburton has
rightly remarked, consists in this, that the French hose
3

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

415

being [then] very short and strait, a tailor must be
master of his trade who could steal any thing from
them." From a passage in our author's Henry V. and
from other proofs, we know, that about the year 1597
the French hose were very large and lusty ; but,
doubtless, between that year and 1600 they had
adopted the fashion here alluded to ; and we know,
as I have elsewhere observed, that French fashions
were very quickly adopted in England. Some
are (says a writer in 1604) so inconstant in their
attire, that the variety of their garments pregnantly

proveth the fickleness of their heade And

surely the Frenchmen and Englishmen, of all
nations are (not without good cause) noted and con-
demned of this lightness ; the one for invention, the
other for imitating. In other thinges we thinke
them our inferiours, and here we make them our
maisters: and some I have heard very con-
temptuously say, that scarcely a new forme of
breeches appeared in the French Kings kitchen, but
presently they were translated into the Court of
England^." From the following passage in The
Black Year, by Anthony Nixon, 4 to. 160 6, it may
be presumed that this new mode of dress had been
then adopted in England :

" Gentlemen this year shall be much wronged by
their taylors, for their consciences are now much
larger then ever they were ; for where [whereas]

9 The Passions of the Minde in Generalle, by Thomas
Wright, 4-to. 1604-.

416 LIFE OF SHAKSPEAKE.

they were wont to steale but half a yeard of brood
cloth in making up a payre of breeches, now they do
largely nicke their customers in the lace too; and
take more than enough, for the new fashions sake,
besides their old ones." The words printed in italics,
I am aware, may relate only to the lace ; but I rather
think that the meaning is, that whereas, formerly,
tailors used to steal half a yard of cloth in making a
pair of breeches, but now they cheat in the lace also ;
and steal more than enough of the cloth for the sake
of making the breeches close and tight, agreeably to
the new fashion. In a preceding passage, the writer
repeats Wright's words already quoted, without any
acknowledgement, " This year many," &c.

Guthrie asserts in his History of Scotland, that
King James, " to prove how thoroughly he was
emancipated from the tutelage of his clergy, desired
Queen Elizabeth in the year 1599 to send him a
company of English comedians. She complied, and
James gave them a licence to act in his capital and
in his court. I have great reason to think (adds the
historian), that the immortal Shakspeare was of the
number ^ But his drama, which finds access at this
day to the most insensible hearts, had no charms in
the eyes of the presbyterian clergy. They threatened
excommunication to all who attended the playhouse.
Many forebore to attend the theatrical exhibitions.

* If the writer had any ground for this assertion, why was it
not stated? It is extremely improbable that Shakspeare should
have left London at this period. In 1599 his King Henry V. was
produced, and without doubt acted with great applause.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 417

James considered the insolent interposition of the
clergy as a fresh attack upon his prerogative, and
ordered those who had been most active, to retract
their menaces, which they unwillingly did ; and we
are told that the playhouse was then greatly
crouded."

A more correct statement of this anecdote of
theatrical history will be found in the History of the
Stage, vol. iii. ; but it is certain, that James, after
his accession to the English throne, was a great
encourager of theatrical exhibitions. From 1604 to
1608 he devoted himself entirely to hunting, masques,
plays, tiltings, &c. In 1605 he visited Oxford. From
a book entitled Rex Platonicus, cited by Dr. Farmer,
we leam, that on entering the city the king was ad-
dressed by three students of St. John's College, who
alternately accosted his majesty, reciting some Latin
verses, founded on the prediction of the weird sisters
relative to Banquo and Macbeth ^.

Dr. Farmer is of opinion, that this performance
preceded Shakspeare's play ; a supposition which is
strengthened by the silence of the author of Rex
Platonicus, who, if Macbeth had then appeared on
the stage, would probably have mentioned some-
thing of it. It should be likewise remembered, that
there subsisted at that time, a spirit of opposition
and rivalship between the regular players and the
academicks of the two universities; the latter of
whom frequently acted plays both in Latin and
English, and seem to have piqued themselves on the

VOL. II.

< See vol. xi. p. 281.
2 E

418 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

superiority of their exhibitions to those of the esta-
blished theatres^. Wishing probably to manifest
this superiority to the royal pedant, it is not likely
that they would choose for a collegiate interlude (if
this little performance deserves that name), a subject
which had already appeared on the publick stage,
with all the embellishments that the magick hand of
Shakspeare could bestow.

In the following July (1606) the King of Den-
mark came to England on a visit to his sister. Queen
Anne, and on the third of August was installed a
knight of the garter. " There is nothing to be heard
at court," (says Drummond of Hawthornden in a
letter dated that day), " but sounding of trumpets,
hautboys, musick, revellings, and comedies." Perhaps
during this visit Macbeth was first exhibited.

This tragedy contains an allusion to the union of
the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and
Ireland, under one sovereign, and also to the cure
of the king's evil by the royal touch ^. A ritual for
the healing of that distemper was established early

* Ab ejusdem collegii alumnis (qui et cothurno tragico et socco
comico principes semper habebantur) VertumnuSy comoedia
faceta, ad principes exhilarandos exhibetur. Rex Platonicus,
p. 78.

Arcadiam restauratam Isiacorum Arcadum lectissimi ceci-
nerunt, unoque opere, principum omniumque spectantium animos
imraensa et ultra fidem affecerunt voluptate ; simulque patrios
ludiones, etsi exercitatissimos, quantum intersit inter scenam mer-
cenariam et eruditam docuerunt. lb. p. 228. See also, The
Return from Parnassus (Act IV. Sc. III.), which was acted
publickly at St. John's College in Cambridge.

6 Macbeth, Act IV. Sc. I. II.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

419

in this reign ; but in what year that pretended power
was assumed by King James L is uncertain.

Macbeth was not entered on the Stationers' books,
nor printed, till 1623.

In the tragedy of Caesar and Pompey, or Caesar's
Revenge, are these lines :

" Why, think you, lords, that 'tis ambition's spur
*' That pricketh Caesar to these high attempts ? "

If the author of that play, which was published in
1607, should be thought to have had Macbeth's
soliloquy in view (which is not unlikely), this circum-
stance may add some degree of probability to the
supposition that this tragedy had appeared before
that year :

** I have no spur.

To prick the sides of my intent, but only

Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself,
" And falls at the other

At the time when Macbeth is supposed to have
been written, the subject, it is probable, was con-
sidered as a topick the most likely to conciliate the
favour of the court. In the additions to Warner's
Albion's England, which were first printed in I6O6,
the story of " The Three Fairies or Weird Elves,"
as he calls them, is shortly told, and King James's
descent from Banquo carefully deduced.

Ben Jonson, a few years afterwards, paid his court
to his majesty by his Masque of Queens ^, presented
at Whitehall, Feb. 12, 1609 ; in which he has given

7 Mr. Upton was of opinion that this masque preceded Mac-
beth. But the only ground which he states for this conjecture,
is, *' that Jonson's pride would not suffer him to borrow from
Shakspeare, though he stole frqm the ancients."

2 E 2

420

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

a minute detail of all the magick rites that are
recorded by King James in his book of Daemonologie,
or by any other author ancient or modern.

In the former editions of this Essay, the play
entitled The Witch, and written by Thomas Middle-
ton, has been represented as preceding Macbeth.
That piece had long been unnoticed in manuscript,
till it was discovered, in the year 1779, by the late
Mr. Steevens, in the collection of the late Thomas
Pearson, Esq. On the first discovery, both he and I
were exceedingly struck by the songs introduced in
this piece ; of which it was obvious, at the first view,
that D'Avenant had availed himself in the altera-
tions and additions made to this play after the
Restoration. Mr. Steevens, having perused the
manuscript before it fell into my hands, wrote the
note inserted below ^, to which I gave the place that

8 In a former note on this tragedy, I have said that the original
edition contains only the two first words of the song in the
fourth Act, beginning—" Black spirits," &c. ; but have lately
discovered the entire stanza in an unpublished dramatick piece,
viz. " A Tragi-Coomodie called The Witch: long since acted
by his Ma.''" Servants at the Black Friers ; written by Tho.
Middletonr The song is there called— " A charme-song, about a
vessell." The other song, omitted in the fifth Scene of the third
Act of Macbeth, together with the imperfect couplet there, may
likewise be found, as follows, in Middleton's performance.—The
Hecate of Shakspeare says :

*' I am for the air," &c.

The Hecate of Middleton (who like the former is summoned
away by aerial spirits) has the same declaration in almost the
same words :

" I am for aloft," &c.
" Song.] Come away, come away : \ ^J^^
** Heccat, Heccat, come away J

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 421

it here holds in this Essay, and which, from respect
to him, I yet suffer it to retain; but I am now

** Hec, I come, I come, I come,

" With all the speed I may,
" With all the speed I may.
" Wher's Stadlin ?

** Heere.] in the aire.
" Wher's Puckle?

*' Heere.] in the aire.
••And Hoppo too, and Hellwaine too. \
'• We lack but you, we lack but you : >in the aire.
•• Come away, make up the count. ^
*' Hec. I will but 'noynt, and then I mount.

.There's one comes downe to fetch his

A spirit like
cat descends

^1 here's one comes downe to fetch his")
like a J dues, I
tids. I A kisse, a coll, a sip of blood : \

^» A M «»fV>T7 4-l-»/-*ii c^-mo*- C7 r% \r\^nr

And why thou staist so long
" I muse, I muse,
•' Since the air's so sweet and good.
" Hec. Oh, art thou come ?

*' What newes, what newes ?
•• All goes still to our delight, ^

** Either come, or els >above.

" Refuse, refuse.-^
** Hec. Now I am furnish'd for the flight.

*' Fire.'] Hark, hark, the catt sings a brave treble in her owne

[language.

Hec. going up.] Now I goe, now ! flie,

*' Malkin, my sweete spirit, and L
*' Oh what a daintie pleasure 'tis,
*' To ride in the aire,
" When the raoone shines faire,
*' And sing, and daunce, and toy and kiss !
" Over woods, high rocks and mountains,
*' Over seas, our mistris' fountains,
*' Over steepe towres and turrets,
*' We fly by night 'mongst troopesof spiritts.
•' No ring of bells to our cares sounds,
** No hovvlcs of vvoolves, no yclpes ot hounds ;

422

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

clearly of opinion that I too hastily acquiesced in his
notion concerning the priority of that play to

*' No, not the noyse of waters'-breache,
" Or cannons' throat, our height can reache.
" No ring of bells, &c.] above.
** Fire.'] Well, mother, I thank your kindness : you must be
gombolling i' th' aire, and leave me to walk here, like a foole and
a mortall. Exit. Finis Actus Tercii."

This Fire-stone, who occasionally interposes in the course of
the dialogue, is called, in the List of Persons Represented, —
*' The Clowne and Heccat's son."
Again, the Heccate of Shakspeare says to her sisters :
I'll charm the air to give a sound,
*' While you perform your antique round, &c.

" [Musick. The Witches dance and vanish.'*
The Hecate of Middleton says on a similar occasion :

*' Come, my sweete sisters, let the aire strike our tune,
*' Whilst we shew reverence to yond peeping moone.

" [Here they dance, and exeunt.'^
In this play, the motives which incline the Witches to mis-
chief, their manners, the contents of their cauldron, &c. seem to
have more than accidental resemblance to the same particulars
in Macbeth. The hags of Middleton, like the weird sisters of
Shakspeare, destroy cattle because they have been refused provi-
sions at farm-houses. The owl and the cat (Gray Malkin) give
them notice when it is time to proceed on their several expedi-
tions. Thus Shakspeare's Witch :

** Harper cries ; — 'tis time, 'tis time."
Thus too the Hecate of Middleton :

" Hec.'] Heard you the owle yet ?
" Stad.] Briefely in the copps.
" Hec.'] *Tis high time for us then."
The Hecate of Shakspeare^ addressing her sisters, observes,
that Macbeth is but " a wayward son, who loves for his own
ends, not for them." The Hecate of Middleton has the same
observation, when the youth who has been consulting her,
retires :

I know he loves me not, nor there's no hope on't."
Instead of the " grease that's sweaten from the murderer's
gibbet," and the " finger of birth-strangled babe," the Witches

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

423

Macbeth, and that the Witch was not written till
some years afterwards, probably not till about the year

of MIddleton employ " the gristle of a man that hangs after
sunset" (i.e. of a murderer, for all other criminals were anciently
cut down before evening), and the " fat of an unbaptized child."
They likewise boast of the power to raise tempests that shal/
blow down trees, overthrow buildings, and occasion shipwreck ;
and, more particularly, that they can " make miles of woods
walk." Here too the Grecian Hecate is degraded into a presiding
witch, and exercised in superstitions peculiar to our own country.
So much for the scenes of enchantment ; but even other parts of
Middleton's play coincide more than once with that of Shak-
speare. Lady Macbeth says, in Art II. :
*• the surfeited grooms

*' Do mock their charge with snores. I have drugged their
possets"

So too, F'rancisca, in the piece of Middleton :

*' they're now all at rest,

" And Caspar there and all : — List ! — fast asleepe ;
'* He cryes it hither. — I must disease you strait, sir :
'* For the maide-servants, and the girles o' th' house,
" I ^p/cWthem lately with a drotvsie posset ,
" They will not hear in haste."
And Francisca, like Lady Macbeth, is watching late at night to
encourage the perpetration of a murder.

The expression which Shakspeare has put into the mouth of
Macbeth, when he is sufficiently recollected to perceive that the
dagger and the blood on it, were the creation of his own fancy, —
*' There's no such thing," — is likewise appropriated to Francisca,
when she undeceives her brother, whose imagination had been
equally abused.

From the instances already produced, perhaps the reader would
allow, that if Middleton's piece preceded Shakspeare's, the ori-
ginality of the magick introduced by the latter, might be fairly
questioned ; for our author (who as actor, and manager, had
access to unpublished dramatick performances) has so often con-
descended to receive hints from his contemporaries, that our sus-
picion of his having been a copyist in the present instance, might
not be without foundation. Nay, perhaps, a time may arrive, in

424

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

1613. The grounds of this opinion I shall now lay
before the reader.

which it will become evident from books and manuscripts yet un-
discovered and unexamined, that Shakspeare never attempted a
play on any argument, till the effect of the same story, or at least
the ruling incidents in it, had been already tried on the stage,
and familiarized to his audience. Let it be remembered, in sup-
port of this conjecture, that dramatick pieces on the following
subjects, — viz. King John, King Richard 11. and III. King
Henry IV. and V. King Henry VIII. King Lear, Antony and
Cleopatra, Measure for Measure, The Merchant of Venice, The
Taming of a Shrew, and The Comedy of Errors, — had appeared
before those of Shakspeare, and that he has taken somewhat
from all of them that we have hitherto seen. I must observe at
the same time, that Middleton, in his other dramas, is found to
have borrowed little from the sentiments, and nothing from the
fables of his predecessors. He is known to have written in
concert with Jonson, Fletcher, Massinger, and Rowley ; but ap-
pears to have been unacquainted, or at least unconnected, with
Shakspeare.

It is true that the date of The Witch cannot be ascertained.
The author, however, in his dedication ('* to the truelie-worthie
and generously-affected Thomas Holmes, Esquire,") observes,
that he " recovered this ignorant ill-fated labour of his (from the
playhouse, I suppose), not without much difficultie. Witches
(continues he) are, ipso facto, by the law condemn'd, and that
onely, I thincke, hath made her lie so long in an imprison'd ob-
scuritie," It is probable, therefore, from these words, as well as
from the title-page, that the play was written Zow^* before the
dedication, which seems to have been added soon after the year

* That dramatick pieces were sometimes written long before they
were printed, may be proved from the example of Marlowe's
Rich Jew of Malta, which was entered on the books of the Sta-
tioners' Company in the year 1591<, but was not published till
1633, as we learn from the preface to it written by Heywood. It
appears likewise from the same registers, that several plays were
VvTitten, that were never published at all. Stecvens.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

425

Thinking it proper, on the present occasion, to
read this piece over a second time with the greatest

1603, when the act of King James against witches passed into a
law. If it be objected, that The Witch appears from this title-
page to have been acted only by his majesty's servants, let it be
remembered that these were the very players who had been be-
fore in the service of the Queen ; but Middleton, dedicating his
work in the time of James, speaks of them only as dependants
on the reigning prince.

Here too it may be remarked, that the first dramatick piece in
which Middleton is known to have had a hand, viz. The Old Law,
was acted in 1599; so that The Witch might have been com-
posed, if not performed at an earlier period * than the accession
of James to the crown ; for the belief of witchcraft was suffi-
ciently popular in the preceding reigns. The piece in question
might likewise have been neglected through the caprice of
players, or retarded till it could be known that James would
permit such representations ; (for on his arrival here, both
authors and actors who should have ventured to bring the mid-
night mirth and jollity of witches on the stage, would probably
have been indicted as favourers of magick and enchantment :) or, it
might have shrunk into obscurity after the appearance of
Macbeth ; or perhaps was forbidden by the command of the king.
The witches of Shakspeare (exclusive of the flattering circum-
stance to which their prophecy alludes) are solemn in their
operations, and therefore behaved in conformity to his majesty's
own opinions. On the contrary, the hags of Middleton are ludi-
crous in their conduct, and lessen, by ridiculous combinations of
images, the solemnity of that magick in which ourscepter'd perse-
cutor of old women most reverently and potently believed.

The conclusion to Middleton's dedication, has likewise a degree
of singularity that deserves notice, — " For your sake alone, she

* The spelling in the MS. is sometimes more antiquated than
any to be met with in the printed copies of Shakspeare, as the
following instances may prove : — Byn for been — sollempnely for
solemnly — dnmpnation for damnation — quight for quite — grizzle
for gristle— doa for doe --olj/ff' (or olive, &c. Steevens.

426

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

attention, I discovered that it contained the follow-
ing notes of time, which, though perhaps no one of
them furnishes a decisive proof of what I have stated,
yet, when combined together, afford, in my opinion,
a sufficient ground for attributing this play to the
period I have mentioned.

hath thus conjur'd herself abroad ; and bears no other charmes
about her, but what may tend to your recreation ; nor no other
spell, but to possess you with a beleif, that as she, so he, that
Jirst taught her to enchant, will alwaies be," &c.— He that
taught her to enchant," would have sufficiently expressed the
obvious meaning of the writer, without aid from the word Jtrst^
which seems to imply a covert censure on some person who had
engaged his Hecate in a secondary course of witchcraft.

The reader must have inferred from the specimen of incantation
already given, that this MS. play (which was purchased by Major
Pearson out of the collection of Benjamin Griffin, the player, and
is in all probability the presentation copy) had indubitably passed
through the hands of Sir William D'Avenant ; for almost all the
additions which he pretends to have made to the scenes of witch-
craft in Macbeth (together with the names of the supplemental
agents) are adopted from Middleton. It was not the interest,
therefore, of Sir William, that this piece should ever appear in
print : but time that makes more important discoveries, has like-
wise brought his petty plagiarism to light*.

I should remark, that Sir W. D. has corrupted several words
as well as proper names in the songs, &c. but it were needless to
particularize his mistakes, as this entire tragi-comedy will here-
after be published for the satisfaction of the curious and intelli-
gent readers of Shakspeare. Steevens.

* Sir William D'Avenant might likewise have formed his play
of Albovine King of Lombardy on some of the tragick scenes in
this unpublished piece by Middleton. Yet the chief circumstances
on which they are both founded, occur in the fourth volume of
the Histoires Tragiques, &c. par Francois de Belle-forest, 1.580,
p. 297, and at the beginning of Machiavel's Florentine History.

Steevens.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 427

The first passage that deserves our notice is the
following, in the first scene. The speaker is Florida,
a courtesan :

*' Flo. I find thee still so comfortable,
•* Beshrew my hart, if I knew how to misse thee :
" They talk of gentlemen, perfumersy and such things :
" Give me the kindness of the Master's man,
" In my distresse, say L"

I am aware that perfumed gloves and jerkins were
much in fashion, even in the time of Queen Eliza-
beth ; and continued to be so in the time of James
the First ; but I very much doubt whether there was
any established trade of this kind, so as to give a
specifick and distinct denomination to the vender of
perfumery, early in the reign of James, though about
the middle of his reign, such perfumers may have been
common enough. In 1603, Don Juan de Taxis,
the Spanish Ambassador, brought in his train to
London a perfumer ^ which he scarcely would have
done, had such a trade been established in London.

The second passage that I shall take notice of is

also in the same scene :

Al. Amsterdam swallow thee for a puritan^
*' And Geneva cast thee up again, like she,
" That sunk at Charing-cross^ and rose again
" At Queenhith."

After the conference at Hampton Court, in 1604,
the dramatick writers much more frequently intro-
duced strokes at the Puritans than they did before ;
and particularly about 1607 and 1608, and for some
years afterwards. This speech, therefore, seems rather
to point to the period to which I attribute the Witch,

9 Illustrations of British Hist. iii. 176.

428

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

than to the reign of Elizabeth, or the first year of
King James.

In the same scene, the same speaker says —

" ' — I will not to the witches ;

" They say they have charmes and tricks to make a wench

*' [To] lead a man herself

** To a country house, some mile out of the town,
" Like a fierdrake."

The country house here alluded to was at Brent-
ford ; and in the plays written in 1607? and for some
years afterwards, there are frequent allusions to the
practice of carrying women of the town thither. I
have not observed such allusions in the plays of an
earlier period.

In the second scene of the same act, Hecate
speaking of Stradling says,

« She

*' Flyes over houses and takes An7io Domini

** Out of a rich mans chimney, a sweet place for't,

*' He w** be hangd ere he w** set his own years there

*' (His rotten diseas'd yeares) ; they must be chamberd

*' In a five pound picture, a green silk curtaine

" Drawne before the eyes oft. — Or dost thou envy," &c.

In the time of Elizabeth doubtless instances
enough may be found of the dates of houses being
placed on some part of the building : but as it is well
known that a great accession of wealth was poured
into England after the peace with Spain, it may be
presumed that this circumstance gave rise to many
new buildings in every county of England, as we

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

429

have decisive proofs it did to an immense addition to
London between the King's accession and the middle
of his reign. The numerous buildings that were
erected in various parts of the country towards the
middle of his reign, with their anno domini duly
affixed, were then more likely to attract the poet's
observation; and consequently this circumstance also
leads to a later date than has been assigned to this
piece. With respect to the Ji've pound picture I
have reason to believe that this was the ordinary
price of a portrait about the year 1612! or 1613 ; but
whether it was not also the price about the accession
of James, I have no means of determining. If it
was, it supplies no aid to my hypothesis. In October,
1612, Robert Peake, picture maker, who was after-
wards knighted, received on the Council's warrant
tzventy pounds ioY painting three several pictures, at
the command and for the use of the Duke of York,
afterwards Charles I. We may presume that this
was a liberal payment, and that five pounds was then
the price paid by persons in a less elevated station
than the king's son.^ Cornelius Jansen's price at that
time for a head, or, as the painters call it, a three
quarters cloth, was five broad pieces. Mr. Walpole
has stated that Jansen came into England about the
year 1618 ; but this is a mistake; for I have a por-
trait painted by him, dated 1611, which had be-
longed for more than a century to a family that lived
at Chelsea.

» MS. Stanhope in Bib. Bodl,

430 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

In the last scene of the fourth act we find these
lines :

'* Run ; knock up Aberzanes suddenly ;
" Say, I desire his company this morning
** To yonder horse race.'"

It is extremely difficult to ascertain the precise
period when horse-races were generally and puhlickly
established, with known and fixed prizes for the victor.
It has already been observed, that probably from a very
early period private horse-races, or matches for wagers,
were common ; and we know from Camden, that in
1594, or before, publick annual races were established
in Yorkshire, in which a small gold bell was allotted
to the winning horse. But I doubt much whether this
practice prevailed in any other county, or at least in
any county in the neighbourhood of London, before
the middle of King James's time. Markham, who
in 1606 republished his treatise on horsemanship,
which had appeared in 1599? has in each edition a
chapter on the running horse ; but he speaks only
of private matches ; and I cannot find any allusion in
either edition to a publick or estabhshed horse-race,
or to what was afterwards called a bell course^ from
the small bell which has been already mentioned as
the usual prize of the victor in the infancy of this
amusement. That no such publick establishment
existed any where but in the North, may be inferred
ako (as has been already observed) from the silence
of a writer in 1609. But in 1612 certainly there
appears to have been publick horse-races at Croydon,
in Surrey, near enough to London to attract the

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 431

notice of the writers of the day; and accordingly
Dekker, in 1613, gave to one of his numerous pam-
phlets the title of A Wonderful Strange Horse
Race.

Having found no notice of any puhlick horse-race
that was likely to attract the notice of a London
dramatick poet before that at Croydon in 1612, I
incline therefore to think that the allusion in Mid-
dleton's play to this amusement was made about that
time ; being more likely to have been suggested by
a well known and established practice, the theme of
general conversation, than by either the private
matches of individuals, or the more publick exhi-
bitions in the remote county of York, which, however
celebrated or well attended in that district, probably
were wholly unknown to the greater part of the inha-
bitants of London. If it shall hereafter be discovered
that public races were established at Croydon soon
after the accession of King James to the English
throne, or on Enfield Chase (both which places have
been already mentioned as being early celebrated for
this kind of sport), the passage which we have here
considered, can have no weight in the decision of this
question.

The next passage which demands our notice is one
that appears to me to point to a later period than
has hitherto been assigned to this play.

In Act II. Sc. I. Francisca, alluding to her being
with child, says,

*' My brother sure would kill me if he knew't,
" And powder up my friend and all his kindred
" For an East Indian voyage."

432

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

It is certain that some voyages of discovery had
been made to the East Indies, and that some little
trade was carried on from England thither, in the
latter end of the reign of Queen Elizabeth; and
accordingly, Sh^kspeare, in or about the year 1601,
makes FalstalF say, while he is exulting in the pros-
pects of his success with the merry wives of Wind-
sor, " I will be 'cheater to them both, and they shall
be an Exchequer to me ; they shall be my East and
West Indies^ and I will trade to them both."

It has already been mentioned that Queen Eliza-
beth's charter was granted to the East India Com-
pany on the last day of December, 1601. Between
that time and the year 1605 there were but three
adventures to the East Indies ; one consisting of
four ships, which sailed in 1602 ; in 1604
three ships were fitted out, and in 1605 three
more : in 1607 two ships sailed; and in 1609, one :
but all these were foreign built, and purchased
abroad, by the company. At length, in 1610, having
previously received from King James an enlarge-
ment of their charter, they built a large ship of 1200
tons, which was named the Trade's Increase, by King
James, who dined on board the new-built vessel
when she was named. The commander of this ship
was Sir Henry Middleton, perhaps a relation of the
poet; and he sailed in spring 1611; but he never
returned. Now in the infant state of that trade
between the years 1601 and 1605, during which
period so very few ships went from England to the
East Indies, it appears to me extremely unlikely that
the writer of the Witch should have been attentive to

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 433

the circumstance of these vessels being furnished
with the due store of powdered or salted provisions
for their voyage ; though afterwards the notorious
fact of a great ship being for the first time built at
home for this trade, and of its being honoured by the
king's dining on board her the day she was named,
would naturally attract his attention, more especially
as the person who had the command of this vessel,
was his namesake, if not his relation. This obser-
vation, therefore, stands nearly on the same ground
with that just now made. It is not asserted that the
poet could not possibly have had any experience of
an East India ship being furnished with salted pro-
visions for her voyage, between the year 1601 and
1605 ; but that at a more advanced period, and par-
ticularly in 1612 or 1613, after the publick notice had
recently been attracted by the ceremonial which has
been mentioned, such a circumstance was more likely
to present itself to his mind. But there are other
arguments, drawn from a re-perusal of this play, which
have added to my conviction that this play was not
produced till several years after our author's tragedy,
probably not before 1613.

The paragraph most material for our consideration
is that which Middleton himself has prefixed to his
play : " The tragi-coomodie called the Witch, long
since acted by his Ma*'^'. Servants at the Blackfriers."

On the words long since, Mr. Steevens much re-
lied; but if we turn to the preface to the second
edition of this author's comedy, called A Mad World
my Masters, by the bookseller who published it, we
shall see how short a portion of time was understood

VOL. II. 2 F

434

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

in those days by the term long since; for in this
preface, published in 1640, he tells us that the
author was long since dead : now he was certainly
living in 1627; and therefore supposing even that he
died in that year, it appears that a period of thirteen
years was considered sufficient to justify such an
expression as Middleton has used concerning his
tragi-comedy. If his play was performed in 1613 or
1614, and this recovered copy addressed to Mr.
Holmes in 1626 or 1627, this interval, we see, would
warrant such a description as he has given of this
piece, which is very material in our present inquiry ;
for Middleton wrote the Widow with Fletcher and
Massinger doubtless after 1613 ; hence, and from the
vogue of Fletcher, he might catch his manner. The
metre of the Witch strongly resembles that of
Fletcher. He adds, that it was played by his Ma-
jesty's servants at the Blackfriars. There is good
reason to believe that the house in Blackfriars did not
become the established theatre of the king's servants
till the year 1613; when the Globe being burnt
down, they were obliged to find another playhouse.

From that period to the suppression of the theatres
in 1641, this theatre was their great place of scenical
representation; for though about the year 1620, or
soon afterwards, the Globe appears to have been
repaired, very few plays only were occasionally acted;
and it at length became devoted to prize fighting,
and other low exhibitions. On the contrary, before
the fire (from 1603 to 1613), we have not a single
play extant which is said to have been performed by
the king's servants at Blackfriars. In the patent in

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 435

1603, and the paper signed by Mr. Tylney in 1604,
no mention is made of this theatre : and King Lear
is expressly mentioned as being acted by the King's
Company at the Globe, their usual theatre. Possibly
it may be said that this very word imports that some-
times they exhibited elsewhere even during the
period I have mentioned. Perhaps they might, but
I believe very rarely ; and if ever in this period they
acted at the Blackfriars, they must have hired the
house for the night; for during this while this house
appears to have been possessed by the Children of the
Revels and the Children of the Chapel ; for in this
period we find no less than twenty-five new plays
represented there by these children ; so that during
this period it appears to have been the established
theatre of the Children of the Revels and of the
King's Chapel, and not of his Majesty's own servants.

Some obscurity has been thrown on this subject by
the title pages of different editions of our old plays.
Thus, for example, Beaumont and Fletcher's King
and No King, which was one of their early plays, was
originally represented at the Globe, and is so de-
scribed in the first edition in 1619. But in a sub-
sequent edition at a later period, the editor in 1625^
knowing how often it had been acted at Blackfriars,
(where probably it was revived in 1619, when the
play was first published), substitutes these words :
" Acted at the B. F. by his Maj. Servants ; " and the
Dramatic Dictionaries tell us, in consequence, that
this play was acted at these two theatres, and so un-
doubtedly it was, but not at the same period. This

2 F 2

436 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

observation I shall presently apply to some of Mid-
dleton's plays.

Middleton has left us eighteen plays of his own
composition. He appears to have begun to vv^rite for
the stage soon after the year 1600 ; and between
that year and 1608, he produced seven plays, Blurt
Master Constable, The Phoenix, Michaelmas Term,
A Trick to Catch the Old One, A Mad World my
Masters, The Family of Love, and Your Five Gallants.
— ^Now every one of these, his early plays, were per-
formed by children ; the first four by the Children of
Pauls, at their own usual place of exhibition ; the other
two by the Children of the Revels at Blackfriars ;
where, as I have already mentioned, they usually per-
formed from the accession of King James to the year
1613. After that year, two of those plays, A Mad
World my Masters, and A Trick to Catch the Old One,
were revived by the King's Servants at Blackfriars ;
and in consequence, in the editions of these plays, the
one in 1616, the other in 1640, they are truly said
to have been performed at Blackfriars, and no other
theatre is mentioned, that being then the favourite
and fashionable house ; and the others quite passed
away and forgotten. The same things as I have
mentioned above, happened with respect to King and
No King and several other plays.

To pursue Middleton further, on examining the
title-pages and history of his other plays produced
after 1608 (though we have less concern with them,
because if the Witch preceded Macbeth, it must have
been produced before 1606), we shall find that he

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 437

had very little connection with the Blackfriars Com-
pany. His Chaste Maid of Cheapside was performed
at the Swan in Southwark, by Prince Charles's Ser-
vants between 1613 and 1620; his Roaring Girl
(written in conjunction with Dekker), at the Fortune,
by AUeyn's Company in or before 1611 ; his Change-
ling, at Salisbury Court, in or before 1623 ; his Fair
Quarrel, in or before 1622, at the Fortune; his Spa-
nish Gipsey, between 1617 and 1623, at the Phoenix,
in Drury Lane. I have now accounted for thirteen of
his plays out of eighteen, none of which were produced
originally by the King's Servants. Of the other five,
the Mayor of Queenborough should seem to have been
originally acted in 1602, by Alleyn's Company. The
Game at Chess was acted at the Globe by the King's
Servants in 1625 ; and the other four. Any Thing
for a Quiet Life, No Wit Like a Woman's, More
Dissemblers beside Women, and Women beware
Women, being published long after his death, it is
reasonable to suppose were acted at a late period, I
mean between 1613 and 1625, rather at some other
theatre than the Blackfriars ; though, if it should turn
out that they were every one performed there, it would
not at all affect the present argument ^.

From all these premises, I think it reasonable to
conclude, as Middleton's early plays were performed
by the Children of the Chapel or the Children of Pauls,

^ N. Field's Amends for Ladies is said to have been acted by
the Prince's servants, and Lady Elizabeth at Blackfriars. It ap-
pears before 1682. (See Preface to two other plays.) So it
appears that these companies hired that house. Thus this shows
it could not be then in possession of the King's Servants.

438

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

and, as we are told by the author himself, that
his piece was performed by the King's Servants at the
Blackfriars, that play must have been produced after
1613, when they first became possessed of that
theatre ; and if so, it can have no claim to contest
precedence with Macbeth, which unquestionably was
acted in 1606.

Other pieces of equal curiosity with this play, may,
perhaps, be hereafter discovered ; for the names of
several ancient plays are preserved, which are not
known to have been ever printed. Thus we hear of
Valentine and Orson, plaied by her Majesties players,
— The tragedy of Ninus and Semiramis, — Titirus
and Galathea, — Godfrey of BuUoigne, — The Cradle
of Securitie, — Hit the Naile o' the Head, — Sir
Thomas More, (Harl. MS. 7,368,)— The Isle of
Dogs, by Thomas Nashe, — The comedy of Fidele
and Fortunatus, — The famous tragedy of The De-
struction of Jerusalem, by Dr. Legge, — The Freeman's
Honour, by William Smith, — Mahomet and Irene,
the Faire Greek, — The Play of the Cards, — Cardenio,
— The Knaves, — The Knot of Fools, — Raymond
Duke of Lyons, — The Nobleman, by Cyril Tourneur,
— [the last five, acted in the year 1613,] The Ho-
noured Loves, — The Parliament of Love, — and Non-
such, a comedy ; all by William Rowley : — The
Pilgrimage to Parnassus, by the author of The
Rf:*turn from Parnassus : — Believe as you List, by
Trla^singer : — The Pirate, by Davenport: — Rosania or
Love's Victory, a comedy by Shirley (some of
whose plays were extant in MS. in Langbaine's time) :
— The Twins, a tragedy, acted in 1613 : — Tancredo,

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

439

a tragedy, by Sir Henry Wotton : — Demetrius and
Marsina, or the imperial Impostor and unhappy
Heroine, a tragedy, — The Tyrant, a tragedy, — The
Queen of Corsica, — The Bugbears, — The Second
Maid's Tragedy, — Timon, a comedy: — Catiline's
Conspiracy, a tragedy, — and Captain Mario, a comedy,
both by Stephen Gosson: — The True Historie of
George Scanderbeg, as played by the right hon.
the Earl of Oxenforde's servants, — Jane Shore, —
The Bold Beauchamps, — The Second Part of Sir
John Oldcastle,— The General,— The Toy,— The
Tell-Tale^ a comedy,— The Woman's Plot,— The
Woman's too hard for Him, [both acted at court in
1621,] — The Love-sick Maid, [acted at court in
1629,]— Fulgius and Lucrelle,— The Fool Trans-
formed, a comedy, — The History of Lewis the
Eleventh, King of France, a tragi-com^edy, — The
Chaste Woman against her Will, a comedy, — The
Tooth-Drawer, a comedy, — Honour in the End, a
comedy, — The History of Don Quixote, or the
Knight of the ill-favoured Countenance, a comedy, —
The Fair Spanish Captive, a tragi-comedy, — The
Tragedy of Heildebrand, — Love yields to Honour, —
The Noble Friend, &c. &c. Soon after the Resto-
ration, one Kirkman, a bookseller, printed many dra-
matick pieces that had remained unpublished for
more than sixty years : and in an advertisement

3 The persons represented in this play (which is in my posses-
sion) are — Duke ; Fidelio ; Aspero ; Hortensio ; Borgias ; Pi-
centio; Count Gismond; Fernese ; Bentivoglio; Cosmo; Julio;
Captain; Lieutenant; Ancient; two Doctors; an Ambassador;
Victoria ; Eleanor ; Isabel ; Lesbia. — Scene, Florence.

440

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

subjoined to " A true, perfect, and exact catalogue
of all the comedies, tragedies, &c. that were ever yet
printed and published, till this present year, 1671,^
he says, that although there were, at that time, but
eight hundred and six plays in print, yet many more
had been written and acted, and that " he himself
had some quantity in manuscript''' — The resemblance
between Macbeth and this newly discovered piece by
Middleton, naturally suggests a wish, that if any of
the unpublished plays, above enumerated, be yet in
being, (beside The Second Maid's Tragedy, The
Tell-Tale, Timon, and Sir Thomas More, which are
well known to be extant), their possessors would con-
descend to examine them with attention ; as hence,
perhaps, new lights might be thrown on others of
our author's plays.

It has been already suggested, that it is probable
our author, about the time of his composing Cymbe-
line and Macbeth, devoted some part of his leisure to
the reading of the lives of Caesar and Antony in
North's translation of Plutarch. In the play before
us there are two passages which countenance that
conjecture. " Under him," says Macbeth,

" My genius is rebuk'd, as, it is said,
*• Mark Antony's was by Caesar."

The allusion here is to a passage in the Life of
Antony ; where Shakspeare also found an account of
" the insane root that takes the reason prisoner,"
which he has introduced in Macbeth.

A passage in the 8th book of Daniel's Civil Wars
seems to have been formed on one in this tragedy

4 See vol. xi. p. 68, n. 9.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 441

The seventh and eighth books of Daniel's poem were
first printed in I609.

27. Twelfth Night, 1607.
It has been generally believed, that Shakspeare
retired from the theatre, and ceased to write, about
three years before he died. Mr. Tyrwhitt was dis-
posed to call in question the latter supposition, and
conjectured that Twelfth-Night was written in 1614 :
grounding his opinion on an allusion^, which he
thought it contained, to those parliamentary under-
takers of whom frequent mention is made in the
Journals of the House of Commons for that year ^ ;
who were stigmatized with the invidious name, on
account of their having undertaken to manage the
elections of knights and burgesses in such a manner
as to secure a majority in parliament for the court.
If this allusion was intended, Twelfth-Night
must have been our author's last production ; and,
we may presume, was written after he had re-
tired to Stratford. It is observable that Mr. Ashley,
a member of the House of Commons, in one of the
debates on this subject, says, " that the rumour con-
cerning these undertakers had spread into the
country''

I formerly acquiesced in this opinion, and attri-
buted Twelfth-Night to the year 1614 ; but I am now
inclined to believe that it was produced at an earlier
period, probably in 1607, and that the word under-

5 •* Nay, if you be an undertalcery I am for you." See Twelfth-
Night, Act IV. Sc. III. and the note there.
^ Comm. Journ. vol. i. p. 456, 457, 470.

442

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

taker was used in a more general sense, without the
particular allusion which Mr. Tyrwhitt thought was
intended. [I should not ascribe this admirable comedy
to an earlier date ; for it bears evident marks of
having been a late production, as most of the cha-
racters that it contains are finished to a higher de-
gree of dramatick perfection, than is discoverable in
some of our author's earlier comick performances ^.

In the third Act of this comedy, Decker's West-
ward Hoe seems to be alluded to. Westward Hoe
was printed in 1607, and from the prologue to East-
ward Hoe appears to have been acted in 1604, or
before.

Maria, in Twelfth-Night, speaking of Malvolio,
says, " he does smile his face into more lines than
the new map with the augmentation of the Indies."
I have not been able to learn the date of the map
here alluded to ; but, as it is spoken of as a recent
publication, it may, when discovered, serve to ascer-
tain the date of this play more exactly.

The comedy of What You Will (the second title
of the play now before us), which was entered at Sta-
tioners' Hall, Aug. 9, 1607, was certainly Marston's
play, as it was printed in that year for T. Thorpe,
by whom the above mentioned entry was made ; and
it appears to have been the general practice of the
booksellers at that time, recently before publication,
to enter those plays of which they had procured copies.

Twelfth-Night was not registered on the Sta-
tioners' books, nor printed, till 1623.

1 The comedies particularly alluded to, are, A Midsummer-
Night's Dream, The Comedy of Errors, Love's Labour's Lost,
and The Two Gentlemen of Verona.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 443

It has been thought, that Ben Jonson intended to
ridicule the conduct of this play, in his Every Man
out of his Humour, at the end of Act III. Sc. VI.
where he makes Mitis say, — " That the argument of
his comedy might have been of some other nature, as
of a duke to be in love with a countess, and that
countess to be in love with the duke's son, and the
son in love with the lady's waiting-maid : some such
cross wooing, with a clown to their serving-man,
better than be thus near and familiarly allied to the
time ^"

I do not, however, believe, that Jonson had here
Twelfth-Night in contemplation. If an allusion to
this comedy were intended, it would ascertain it to
have been written before 1599, when Every Man out
of his Humour was first acted. But Meres does not
mention Twelfth-Night in 1598, nor is there any
reason to believe that it then existed.

" Mrs. Mall's picture," which is mentioned in this
play, probably means the picture of Moll Cutpurse,
who was born in 1585.

In a pleasant conceited comedie How to Choose a
Good Wife from a Bad, 1602, this passage occurs :

" Ful. Wheres your husband ?
** Mrs, Ar. Not within.

*• Anselm. Who? M. Arthur? him I saw even now
At Mistress Maries, the brave curtezans."

Though this is a description, not of Moll Cut-purse,
but of a courtesan, afterwards introduced in the play,
yet doubtless the name of Mrs. Mary was here
adopted from the celebrity of her namesake.

8 See the first note on Twelfth-Night, Act L Sc. I.

444 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

The Sophy of Persia is twice mentioned in Twelfth
Night. 1. "I will not give my part of this sport for
a pension of thousands to he paid hy the Sophy''
2, " He pays you as sure as your feet hit the ground
you step on. They say he has been fencer to the
Sophyr

When Shakspeare wrote the first of these passages,
he was perhaps thinking of Sir Robert Shirley,
" who," says Stowe's Continuator, " after having
served the Sophy of Persia for ten years as general
of artillerie, and married the Lady Teresa, whose
sister was one of the queens of Persia, arrived in
England as ambassador from the Sophy in 1612.
After staying one year he and his wife returned to
Persia (Jan. 1612-13), leaving a son, to whom the
queen was godmother, and Prince Henry godfather.**

Camden's account agrees with this, for according
to him Sir Robert Shirley came to England on his
embassy, June 26, 1612: but both the accounts are
erroneous ; for Sir Robert Shirley certainly arrived
in London as ambassador from the Sophy in 1611, as
appears from a letter written by him to Henry Prince
of Wales, dated Nov. 4, 1611, requesting the
prince to be god-father to his son \ Sir Robert, and
his Persian lady, at this time made much noise ; and
Shakspeare, as I formerly thought, here alluded to
the magnificence which he displayed during his stay
in England, out of the funds allotted to him by the
emperor of Persia. He remained in England about
eighteen months. But nothing is proved by these
circumstances ; for the history of Shirley was well

' MSS. Harl. 7008.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

445

known in England in 1607, and a play expressly
written on the subject, called The Travells of Three
English Brothers, appeared in that year.

27. Julius Ccesar, I607.

A tragedy on the subject, and with the title, of
Julius Caesar, written by Mr. William Alexander,
who was afterwards Earl of Sterline, was printed in
the year 1607. This, I imagine, was prior to our
author's performance, which was not entered at Sta-
tioners' Hall, nor printed, till 1623. Shakspeare, we
know, formed at least twelve plays on fables that had
been unsuccessfully managed by other poets ^ ; but no
contemporary writer was daring enough to enter the
lists with him, in his life-time, or to model into a
drama a subject which had already employed his pen :
and it is not likely that Lord Sterline, who was then
a very young man, and had scarcely unlearned the
Scottish idiom, should have been more hardy than
any other poet of that age.

I am aware, it may be objected, that this writer
might have formed a drama on this story, not
knowing that Shakspeare had previously composed
the tragedy of Julius C^sar; and that, therefore,
the publication of Mr. Alexander's play in 1607, is
no proof that our author's performance did not then
exist.— In answer to this objection, it may, perhaps,
be sufficient to observe, that Mr. Alexander had,
before that year, very wisely left the bleak fields of

* See a note on Julius Csesar, Act L Sc. I. in which they are
enumerated.

446 LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

Menstrie in Clackmananshire, for a warmer and more
courtly residence in London, having been appointed
gentleman of the privy chamber to Prince Henry : in
which situation his literary curiosity must have been
gratified by the earliest notice of the productions of
his brother dramatists.

Lord Sterline's Julius Caesar, though not printed
till 1607, might have been written a year or two
before ; and perhaps its publication in that year was
in consequence of our author's play on the same sub-
ject being then first exhibited. The same obser-
vation may be made with respect to an anonymous
performance, called The Tragedy of Caesar and
Pompey, or Caesar's Revenge ^, of which an edition
(I believe the second) was likewise printed in 1607.
The subject 0 f that piece is the defeat of Pompey at
Pharsalia, ^the death of Julius, and the final over-
throw of Brutus and Cassius at Philippi. The
attention of the town being, perhaps, drawn to
the history of the hook-nosed fellow of Rome, by
the exhibition of Shakspeare's Julius Caesar, the
booksellers, who printed these two plays, might have
flattered themselves with the hope of an expeditious
sale for them at that time, especially, as Shakspeare's
play was not then published.

It does not appear that Lord Sterline's Julius
Caesar was ever acted : neither it nor his other plays

3 There is an edition without date, which probably was the
first. This play, as appears by the title-page, was privately acted
by the students of Trinity College in Oxford. In the running
title it is called The Tragedy of Julius Caesar ; perhaps the bet-
ter to impose it on the publick for the performance of Shakspeare.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 447

being at all calculated for dramatick exhibition. On
the other hand, Shakspeare's Julius Caesar was a very
popular piece ; as we learn from Digges, a contem-
porary writer, who, in his commendatory verses pre-
fixed to our author's works, has alluded to it as one
of his most celebrated performances

We have certain proof that Antony and Cleopatra
was composed before the middle of the year 1608.
An attentive review of that play and Julius Caesar,
will, I think, lead us to conclude that this latter
was first written ^ Not to insist on the chronology

^ ** Nor fire nor cank'ring age, as Naso said

Of his, thy wit-fraught book shall once invade :
'* Nor shall I e'er believe or think thee dead,
" (Though miss'd) untill our bankrout stage be sped
*' (Impossible !) with some new strain t'outdo,
" Passions of Juliet and her Romeo ;
*' Or till I hear a scene more nobly take ,
" Than vohen thy half-svoord parlying Romans spahej"

Verses by L. Digges, prefixed to the first edition
of our author's plays, in 1623.
5 The following passages in Antony and Cleopatra, (and others
of the same kind may perhaps be found,) seem to me to discover
such a knowledge of the appropriated characters of the persons
exhibited in Julius C8e.sar, and of the events there dilated and
enlarged upon, as Shakspeare would necessarily have acquired
from having previously written a play on that subject :
Pompey.'—l do not know
** Wherefore my father should revengers want.

Having a son and friends, since Julius Ccesar,
** Who at Philippi the good Brutus ghosted,
** There saw you labouring for him. What was't,
*' That mov'd pale Cassius to conspire? And what
" Made thee, all-honour d, honest, Roman Brutus,
" With the arm'd rest, courtiers o beauteous freedom.

448

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

of the story, which would naturally suggest this
subject to our author before the other, in Julius
Caesar Shakspeare does not seem to have been tho-
roughly possessed of Antony's character. He has
indeed marked one oiHwo of the striking features of
it, but Antony is not fully delineated till he appears
in that play which takes its name from him and
Cleopatra. The rough sketch would naturally pre-
cede the finished picture.

Shakspeare's making the Capitol the scene of
Csesar's murder, contrary to the truth of history, is
easily accounted for, in Hamlet, where it afforded an
opportunity for introducing a quibble ; but it is not
easy to conjecture why in Julius Caesar he should
have departed from Plutarch, where it is expressly
said that Julius was killed in Fompey's portico, whose
statue was placed in the centre. I suspect he was
led into this deviation from history by some former
play on the subject, the frequent repetition of which
before his own play was written, probably induced
him to insert these lines in his tragedy :

" To drench the capitol, but that they would
** Have one man but a man ?"

So, in another place :

*' When Antony found Julius Caesar dead,
" He cry'd almost to roaring ; and he wept,
" When at Philippi he found Brutus slain.'*

Again :

*' Ant. He at Philippi kept
'* His sword ev'n like a dancer, while I struck
" The lean and uorinkled Cassius ; and 'twas I
" That the mad Brutus ended."

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 449

^ — How many ages hence
" Shall this our lofty scene be acted o'er,
•* In states unborn, and accents yet unknown !
" How many times," &c.

" The accents yet unknown " could not allude to
Dr. Eedes's Latin play exhibited in 1582, and
therefore may be fairly urged as a presumptive proof
that there had been some English play on this sub-
ject previous to that of Shakspeare. Hence I sup-
pose it was, that in his earlier performance he makes
Polonius say that in his youth he had oiacted the
part of the Roman Dictator, and had been killed by
Brutus in Cthe apitol ; a scenick exhibition which
was then probably familiar to the greater part of the
audience. ^

From a passage in the comedy of Every Woman
in her Humour, which was printed in 1609, we learn,
that there was an ancient droll or puppet-shew on the
subject of Julius Csesar. " I have seen (says one of
the personages in that comedy), the City of Nineveh
and Julius Caesar acted by mammets." I formerly
supposed that this droll was formed on the play
before us : but have lately observed that it is men-
tioned with other " motions," (Jonas, Ninevie, and
the Destruction of Jerusalem), in Marston's Dutch
Courtesan, printed in 1605, and was probably of a
much older date.

In the prologue to The False One, by Beaumont
and Fletcher, this play is alluded to ^ ; but in what
year that tragedy was written, is unknown.

^ " New titles warrant not a play for new,
" The subject being old ; and 'tis as true,

VOL. II. 2 a

450

LIFE OF SIIAKSPEARE.

If the date of The Maid's Tragedy by the same
authors, were ascertamed, it might throw some light
on the present inquiry; the quarrelling scene between
Melantius and his friend, being manifestly copied
from a similar scene in Julius Caesar. It has already
been observed that Philaster was the first play which
brought Beaumont and Fletcher into reputation, and
that it probably was represented in 1608 or 1609.
We may therefore presume that the Maid's Tragedy
did not appear before that year ; for we cannot sup-
pose it to have been one of the unsuccessful pieces
which preceded Philaster. That the Maid's Tragedy
was written before 1611, is ascertained by a MS. play,
now extant, entitled The Second Maid's Tragedy,
which was licensed by Sir George Buck, on the 31st
of October, 1611. I believe it never was printed ^.

If, therefore, we fix the date of the original Maid's
Tragedy in 1610, it agrees sufficiently well with that
here assigned to Julius Cassar.

It appears by the papers of the late Mr. George

" Fresh and neat matter may with ease be fram'd
*• Out of their stories that have oft been nam'd
*• With glory on the stage. What borrows he
** From him that wrought old Priam's tragedy,
** That writes his love for Hecuba ? Sure to tell
** Of Caesar's amorous heats, and hoxv he fell

In the Capitol, can never be the same
" To the judicious." Prologue to The False One.
^ This tragedy (as I learn from a MS. of Mr. Oldys) was for-
merly in the possession of John Warburton, Esq. Somerset He-
rald, and since in the library of the Marquis of Lansdown. It
had no author's name to it, when it was licensed, but was after-
wards ascribed to George Chapman, whose name is erased by
another hand, and that of Shakspeare inserted.
3

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 451

Vertue, that a play called Caesar's Tragedy was acted
at court before the 10th of April, in the year 1613.
This was probably Shakspeare's Julius Caesar, it
being much the fashion at that time to alter the titles
of his plays.

29. Antony and Cleopatra, 1608.
Antony and Cleopatra was entered on the Sta-
tioners' books, May 2, 1608 ; but was not printed till
1623.

In Ben Jonson's Silent Woman, Act IV. Sc. IV.
1609, this play seems to be alluded to :

" Morose. Nay, I would sit out a play that were
nothing but Jights at sea, drum, trumpet, and target"

30. Cymbeline, 1609.

Cymbeline was not entered in the Stationers' books,
tior printed, till 1623. It stands the last play in the
earliest folio edition ; but nothing can be collected
from thence, for the folio editors manifestly paid no
attention to chronological arrangement. Nor was
this negligence peculiar to them : for in the folio
collection of D'Avenant's works printed after his
death, Albovine King of the Lombards, one of his
earliest plays^ which had been published in quarto, in
1629, is placed at the end of the volume.

I have found in Cymbeline little internal evidence
by which its date may be ascertained. Such evi-
dence, however, as it furnishes, induces me to ascribe
it to 1609, after Shakspeare had composed King
Lear, and Macbeth. The character of Edgar in
King Lear is undoubtedly formed on that of Leonatus,
the legitimate son of the blind King of Paphlagonia,

2 Cx 2

452

LIFE OF SHAKSFEARE.

in Sydney's Arcadia. Shakspeare having occasion to
turn to that book while he was writing King Lear,
the name of Leonatns adhered to his memory, and
he has made it the name of one of the characters in
Cymbeline. The story of Lear lies near to that of
Cymbeline in Holinshed's Chronicle; and some
account of Duncan and Macbeth is given inciden-
tally in a subsequent page, not very distant from that
part of the volume which is allotted to the history of
those British kings. In Holinshed's Scottish Chro-
nicle we find a story of one Hay, a husbandman, who,
with his two sons, placed himself athwart a lane, and
by this means stayed his flying countrymen ; which
turned the battle against the Danes. This circum-
stance (which our poet has availed himself of in the
fifth Act of the play before us), connected with what
has been already mentioned relative to Sydney's
Arcadia, renders it probable that the three plays of
King Lear, Cymbeline, and Macbeth, were written
about the same period of time, and in the order in
which I have placed them. The history of King
Duff, Duncan, and Macbeth, which Shakspeare
appears to have diligently read, extends from p. 150
of Holinshed's Scottish Chronicle, to p, 176 ; and
the story of Hay occurs in p. 154 of the same
Chronicle.

Mr. Steevens has observed, that there is a passage
in Beaumont and Fletcher's Philaster, which bears
a strong resemblance to a speech of lachimo in
Cymbeline :

" I hear the tread of people: I am hurt ;

The gods take part against me; could this boor
Have held me thus, else? " Philaster^ Act IV. Sc. L

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 453

** I have bely'd a lady,

*• The princess of this country ; and the air of'i
*• Revengingly enfeebles me ; or could this carle,
*' A 'oery drudge of nature's, have subdued me
** In my profession?'* Cymbeline, Act IV. Sc. II.

Philaster had appeared on the stage before l6ll,
being mentioned by John Davies of Hereford, in his
Epigrams, which have no date, but were published
according to Oldys in or about that year ^. Dryden
mentions a tradition (which he might have received
from Sir William D'Avenant), that Philaster was
the first play by which Beaumont and Fletcher
acquired reputation, and that they had written two
or three less successful pieces, before Philaster ap-
peared. From a prologue of D'Avenant's their
first production should seem to have been exhibited
about the year 1605. Philaster, therefore, it may
be presumed, was represented in 1608 or 1609.

One edition of the tract called Westward for
Smelts, from which part of the fable of Cymbeline is
borrowed, was published in 1603.

In this play mention is made of Caesar's im-
measureable ambition, and Cleopatra's sailing on the
Cydnus to meet Antony; from which, and other
circumstances, I think it probable that about this
time Shakspeare perused the lives of Caesar, Brutus^
and Mark Antony.

The versification of this play bears, I think, a
much greater resemblance to that of the Winter's
Tale and the Tempest, than to any of our author's
earlier plays.

2^ Additions to Langbaine's Account of Dramatick Poets, MS.

464

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

31. Coriolanus, 1610.

32. Thiion of Athens, 1610.
These two plays were neither entered in the books
of the Stationers' Company, nor printed, till 1623.
Shakspeare, in the course of somewhat more than
twenty years, having produced thirty-four or thirty-
five dramas, we may presume that he was not idle
any one year of that time. Most of his other plays
have been attributed, on plausible grounds at least,
to former years. As we have no proof to ascertain
when the two plays under our consideration were
written, it seems reasonable to ascribe them to that
period, to which we are not led by any particular
circumstance to attribute any other of his works; at
which, it is supposed, he had not ceased to wTite ;
which yet, unless these pieces were then composed,
must, for aught that now appears, have been unem-
ployed. When once he had availed himself of
North's Plutarch, and had thrown any one of the
lives into a dramatick form, he probably found it so
easy as to induce him to proceed, till he had ex-
hausted all the subjects which he imagined that book
would afford. Hence the four plays of Julius Caesar,
Antony and Cleopatra, Timon, and Coriolanus, are
supposed to have been written in succession. At the
time he was writing Cymbeline and Macbeth there
is reason to believe he began to study Plutarch with
a particular view to the use he might make of it on
the stage ^. The Lives of Cassar and Antony are
nearly connected with each other, and furnished

8 Sec p. 1'34', and p. 447.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

455

him with the fables of two plays : and in the latter
of these lives he found the subject of a third, Timon
of Athens.

There is a MS. comedy now extant, on the sub-
ject of Timon, which, from the hand-writing and
the style, appears to be of the age of Shakspeare. In
this piece a steward is introduced, under the name of
Laches, who, like Flavins in that of our author,
endeavours to restrain his master's profusion, and
faithfully attends him when he is forsaken by all his
other followers. — Here too a mock-banquet is given
by Timon to his false friends ; but, instead of warm
water, stones painted like artichokes are served up,
which he throws at his guests. From a line in Shak-
speare's play, one might be tempted to think that
something of this sort was introduced by him ;
though, through the omission of a marginal direction
in the only ancient copy of this piece, it has not been
customary to exhibit it:

2d Senator, Lord Timon's mad.
** 3fl? Sen. I feel it on my bones.

Sen. One day he gives us diamonds, next day stones**

This comedy (which is evidently the production
of a scholar, many lines of Greek being introduced
into it,) appears to have been written after Ben
Jonson's Every Man out of his Humour (1599), to
which it contains a reference; but I have not dis-
covered the precise time when it was composed.
If it were ascertained, it might be some guide to us
in fixing the date of our author's Timon of Athens,.

45(i

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

which, on the grounds that have been already stated,
I suppose to have been posterior to this anonymous
play.

The great plagues of 1593 and 1603 must have
made such an impression upon Shakspeare, that no
inference can be safely drawn from that dreadful
malady, being more than once alluded to in Timon
of Athens. However it is possible that the following
passages were suggested by the more immediate re-
collection of the plague which raged in 1609.

" I thank them," says Timon, " and would send
them back the plague, could I but catch it for them,"

Again :

** Be as a planetary j^/a^we, when Jove
*' Will o'er some kigh-vic'd citi/ hang his poison
r the sick air."

Cominius, in the panegyrick which he pronounces
on Coriolanus, says,

** In the brunt of seventeen battles since

*' He lurch' d all swords of the garland''

In Ben Jonson's Silent Woman, Act V. Sc. last,
we find (as Mr. Steevens has observed) the same
phraseology : " You have lurched yom friends of the
better half of the garland.''

I formerly thought this a sneer at Shakspeare;
but have lately met with nearly the same phrase in
a pamphlet written by Thomas Nashe, and suppose
it to have been a common phrase of that time.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 457

This play is ascertained to have been written after
the publication of Camden's Remaines, in 1605, by
a speech of Menenius in the first Act, in which he
endeavours to convince the seditious populace of
their unreasonableness by the well-known apologue
of the members of the body rebelling against the
belly. This tale Shakspeare certainly found in the
Life of Coriolanus as translated by North, and in ge-
neral he has followed it as it is there given : but the
same tale is also told of Adrian the Fourth by Cam-
den in his Remaines, p. 199, under the head of Wise
Speeches, with more particularity ; and one or two of
the expressions, as well as the enumeration of the
functions performed by each of the members of the
body, appear to have been taken from that book.

" On a time," says Menenius in Plutarch, " all the
members of a man's body dyd rebel against the bellie,
complaining of it that it only remained in the midest
of the bodie without doing any thing, neither dyd
bear any labour to the maintenaunce of the rest ;
whereas all other partes and members dyd labour
paynefully, and was veri careful to satisfy the appe-
tites and desiers of the bodie. And so the bellie,
all this notwithstanding, laughed at their follie, and
sayde it is true, I first recey ve all meates that norishe
mans bodie ; but afterwardes I send it againe to the
norishment of other partes of the same. Even so
(q*^ he) 0 you, my masters and citizens of Rome," &c.

In Camden the tale runs thus : " All the members
of the body conspired against the stomach, as against
the swallowing gulfe of all their labours ; for whereas
the eies beheld, the earcs heard, the handes laboured.

458

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

the feete travelled, the tongue spake, and all partes
performed their functions; onely the stomache lay
ydle and consumed all. Hereuppon they joyntly
agreed al to forbeare their labours, and to pine away
their lazie and publike enemy. One day passed over,
the second followed very tedious, but the third day
was so grievous to them all, that they called a com-
mon counsel. The eyes waxed dimme, the feete
could not support the body ; the armes waxed lazie,
the tongue faltered, and could not lay open the mat-
ter. Therefore they all with one accord desired the
advice of the heart. There Reason layd open be-'
fore them," &c.
So, Shakspeare :

" There was a time when all the body's members
*' Rebell'd against the belly ; thus accus'd it : —

That only like a gulph it did remain
** In the midst of the body, idle and unactive,
** Still cupboarding the viand, never bearing
*' Like labour with the rest ; where the other instruments
" Did see and hear, devise, instruct, tvalk, /eel,
" And mutually participate did minister
'* Unto the jippetite and affection common
^' Of the whole body. The belly answered—
" True it is, my incorporate friends, quoth he,
" That I receive the general food at first ; —

*' — But, if you do remember,

*' I send it through the rivers of the blood,

*' Even to the court, the hearty to the seat o' the brain.**

The heart is called by one of the citizens, " the
comisellor-heaYt and in making the comiselloj^-
heart the seat of the brain or understanding, where
Reason sits enthroned, Shakspeare has certainly
followed Camden.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. Am

The late date which I have assigned to Coriolanus
derives likewise some support from Volumnia's ex-
hortation to her son, whom she advises to address the
Roman people —

** now humble as the ripest mulberry^

** Which cannot bear the handling."

In a preceding page I have ohserved that mul-
berries were not much known in England before the
year 1609. Some few mulberry-trees however had
been brought from France and planted before that
period, and Shakspeare, we find, had seen some of
the fruit in a state of maturity before he wrote Co-
riolanus \

33. The Winter's Tale, 1611.

In the first edition of this essay, I supposed The
Winter's Tale to have been an early production of
our author, and written in 1594, an error into which
I was led by an entry in the Stationers' registers dated
May 22, in that year, of a piece entitled A Winter-
Night's Pastime, which I imagined might have been
this play under another name, the titles of our
author's plays, having been sometimes changed ^.

' I have some doubts concerning the concluding remark on
the date of this play. The tree which is fit for breeding silk-
worms, is the luhite mulberry, of which great numbers were
imported into England in the year 1609 : but perhaps we had the
other species, which produces the best fruit, before that time.
If that was the case, my hypothesis concerning the time when
our poet planted the celebrated mulberry tree, may be contro-
verted. Valeat quantum valere possit.

* Thus, Hamlet was sometimes called Hamlet's Revenge^

460

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

The opinion, however, which I gave on this
subject, was by no means a decided one. I then
mentioned that " Mr. Walpole thought, that this
play was intended by Shakspeare as an indirect
apology for Anne Bullen, in which light it might be
considered as a Second Part to King Henry VIII. ;
and that my respect for that very judicious and in-
genious writer, the silence of Meres, in whose cata-
logue of our author's dramas published in 1598 the
play before us is not found, and the circumstance
of there not being a single rhyming couplet through-
out this piece, except in the chorus, made me doubt
whether it ought not rather to be ascribed to the year
1601 or 1602, than that in which I then placed it."

The doubts which I then entertained, a more
attentive examination of this play has confirmed;
and I am now persuaded that it was not near so early
a composition as the entry above mentioned led me
to suppose.

Mr. Walpole has observed ^, that " The Winter's
Tale may be ranked among the historick plays of
Shakspeare, though not one of his numerous cri ticks
and commentators have discovered the drift of it.
It was certainly intended (in compliment to Queen
Elizabeth) as an indirect apology for her mother,
Anne Boleyn. .The address of the poet appears nc
where to more advantage. The subject was too deli
cate to be exhibited on the stage without a veil ; and
it was too recent, and touched the queen too nearly,

sometimes The History of Hamlet ; the Merchant of Venice was
sometimes called The Jew of Venice, &c.
3 Historick Doubts^

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

461

foir the bard to have ventured so near an allusion on
any other ground than compliment. The unreason-
able jealousy of Leontes, and his violent conduct in
consequence, form a true portrait of Henry the
Eighth, who generally made the law the engine of
his boisterous passions. Not only the general plan
of the story is most applicable, but several passages
are so marked, that they touch the real history
nearer than the fable. Hermione on her trial says,

• — for honour,

* 'Tis a derivative from me to mine,

* And only that I stand for.'

" This seems to be taken from the very letter of
Anne Boleyn to the king before her execution, when
she pleads for the infant princess, his daughter.
Mamillius, a young prince, an unnecessary character,
dies in his infancy ; but it confirms the allusion, as
Queen Anne, before Elizabeth, had a still-bom son.
But the most striking passage, and which had no-
thing to do in the tragedy, but as it pictured Eliza-
beth, is, where Paulina, describing the new-bora
princess, and her likeness to her father, says, ' she
has the very trick of his frown.' There is another
sentence indeed so applicable, both to Elizabeth and
her father, that I should suspect the poet inserted it
after her death. Paulina, speaking of the child, tells
the king ;

* 'Tis yours ;

* And, might we lay the old proverb to your charge,

* So like you, 'tis the worse V '

This conjecture must, I think, be acknowledged

* See this hypothesis of Mr. Walpole controverted in the Pre-
liminary Remarks to The Winter's Talc, vol. xiv. Boswell.

462

LIFE OF SIIAKSPEARE.

to be extremely plausible. With respect, however, to
the death of the young prince Mamillius, which is
supposed to allude to Queen Anne's having had a
still-born son, it is but fair to observe, that this
circumstance was not an invention of our poet,
being founded on a similar incident in Greene's
Dorastus and Fawnia, in which Garinter, the Mamil-
lius of the Winter's Tale, Hkewise dies in his infancy.

Sir William Blackstone has pointed out a passage
in the first Act of this play, which had escaped my
observation, and which, as he justly observes, fur-
nishes a proof that it was not written till after the
death of Queen Elizabeth :

" If I could find example

*' Of thousands, that had struck anointed kings,
** And flourish'd after, I'd not do it ; but since
** Nor brass, nor stone^ nor parchment, bears not one,
** Let villainy itself forswear it."

These lines could never have been intended for the
ear of her who had deprived the Queen of Scots of
her life* To the son of Mary they could not but
have been agreeable.

Upon these grounds I attributed the appearance of
The Winter's Tale to the year 1604, in my former
edition of Shakspeare, in 1790. But having, before
that work had passed through the press, obtained a
perusal of the office-book of Sir Henry Herbert, from
which large extracts are given in the third volume ; I
was satisfied, from an entry in that register, that this
play was of a still later date, and stated my change of
opinion among the additions and emendations in the
second volume. The entry to which I allude is as
follows, see vol. iii. p. 229 : " For the kings players.

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

463

An olde playe called Winters Tale, formerly allowed
of by Sir George Bucke and likewyse by mee on Mr.
Hemminges his worde that there was nothing pro-
phane added or reformed, thogh the allowed booke
was missing : and therefore I returned it without a
fee, this 19th of August, 1623." Though Sir George
Buck obtained a reversionary grant of the office of
Master of the Revels, in 1603, which title Camden
has given him in the edition of his Britannia, printed
in 1607, it appears, from various documents in the
Pell's-office, that he did not get complete possession
of his place till August, 1610. I, therefore, suppose
The Winter's Tale to have been originally licensed
by him in the latter part of that year or the begin-
ning of the next. The allowed manuscript was pro-
bably destroyed by the fire which consumed the
Globe theatre, June 30, 1613.

There is, says one of the characters in this piece,
" but one Puritan among them, and he sings
psalms to hornpipes." The precise manners of the
puritans were during King James's reign much ridi-
culed by protestants ; and the principal matters in
dispute between them (whether the surplice should
be used in the celebration of divine service, the cross
in baptism, and the ring in marriage), were gravely
discussed at Hampton Court before the king, who
acted as moderator, in the beginning of the year
1604. The points discussed on that occasion were,
without doubt, very popular topicks at that time ;
and every stroke at the puritans, for whom King
James had a hearty detestation, must have been very
agreeable to him as well as to the frequenters of the
theatre, against which that sect inveighed in the

464

LIFE OF SHAKSPEARE.

bitterest terms. Shakspeare, from various passages
in his plays, seems entirely to have coincided in
opinion v^ith his majesty, on this subject.

The Winter's Tale was not entered on the Sta-
tioners'books, nor printed, till 1623. It was acted at
Court in 1613 ^

S4. The Tempest, 1612.

The entry at Stationers' Hall does not contribute
to ascertain the time when this play was composed ;
for it appears not on the Stationers' books, nor was it
printed, till 1623, when it was published vnth the
rest of our author's plays in folio : in which edition,
having, I suppose by mere accident, obtained the
first place, it has ever since preserved a station to
which indubitably it is not entitled \

As the circumstance from which this piece receives
its name, is at an end in the very first scene, and as
many other titles, equally proper, might have occurred
to Shakspeare, (such as The Inchanted Island, — The
Banished Duke, — Ferdinand and Miranda, &c.) I
formerly observed, that some particular and recent
event had determined him to call it The Tempest.

There is reason to believe that some of our author's
dramas obtained their names from the seasons at
which they were produced. It is not very easy to
account for the title of Twelfth Night, but by sup-
posing it to have been first exhibited in the Christ-
mas holydays ^. Neither the title of A Midsummer

4 MS. of the late Mr. Malone.

5 See p. 451, article, Cymbeline.

^ It was formerly an established custom to have plays reprc-

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER. 465

Night's Dream, nor that of The Winter's Tale, de-
notes the season of the action ; the events which are
the subject of the latter, occurring at the time of
sheep-shearing, and the dream, from which the for-
mer receives its name, happening on the night pre-
ceding May-day. — These titles, therefore, were pro-
bably suggested by the season at which the plays
were exhibited, to which they belong ; A Midsummer
Night's Dream having, we may presume, been first
represented in June, and The Winter's Tale in
December. Since this Essay was first published, 1
have collected information on this subject, which
places it in my opinion beyond a doubt that this
play was founded on a recent event, and was produced
in 1611 ^

Mr. Steevens, in his observations on this play, has
quoted from the tragedy of Darius by the Earl of
Sterline, first printed in 1603, some lines ^ so strongly

sented at court in the Christmas holydays, and particularly on
Twelfth Night. Two of Lyly's comedies " (Alexander and Cam-
paspe, ISS^, and Mydas, 1592), are said in their title-pages, to
have been " played befoore the queenes majestie on Twelfe-day
at night ; " and several of Ben Jonson's masques were presented
at Whitehall, on the same festival. Our author's Love's Labour's
Lost was exhibited before Queen Elizabeth in the Christmas
holydays ; and his King Lear was acted before King James on
St. Stephen's night : the night after Christmas-day.

7 See this topick fully discussed in the Dissertation at the end

of vol. XV.

^ Let greatness of her glassy scepters vaunt,

*' Not scepters, no but reeds, soon bruis'd, soon broken,
** And let this worldly pomp our wits enchant,

** All fadesy and scarcely leaves behind a token.
*' Those goXAtn palaces, those gorgeous halls,
*' With furniture superfluously fair,
VOL, II. 2 H

466

LIFE OF SIIAKSPEARE.

resembling a celebrated passage in The Tempest, that
one author must, I apprehend, have been indebted
to the other; if so, Shakspeare must have borrowed
from Lord Sterline ^.

Mr. Holt conjectured ^ that the masque in the
fifth Act of this comedy was intended by the poet
as a compliment to the Earl of Essex, on his being
united in wedlock, in 1611, to Lady Frances Howard,
to whom he had been contracted some years before ^.
Even*if this had been the case, the date which that
commentator has assigned to this play (1614,) is
certainly too late : for it appears from the MSS. of
Mr. Vertue, that the Tempest was acted by John
Heminge and the rest of the King's Company, before
prince Charles, the lady Elizabeth, and the prince
Palatine elector, in the beginning of the year 1613.

** Those stately courts, those sky encountring walls,
** Evanish all like vapours in the air.''

Dariusy Act III. edit. 1603>

*• — These our actors,

** As I foretold you, were all spirits, and

Are melted into air, into thin air ;
•* And, like the baseless fabrick of this vision,
*' The cloud-capt tow'rs, the. gorgeous palaces,
" The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
** Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
*' And, like this unsubstantial pageant faded,
** Leave not a rack behind'' Tempest, Act IV. Sc. I.
9 See note oti Julius Caesar, Act I. Sc. I.
' Observations on The Tempest, p. 67. Mr. Holt imagined,
that Lord Essex was united to Lady Frances Howard in 1610;
but he was mistaken : for their union did not take place till the
next year.

* Jan. 5, 1606-7. The Earl continued abroad four years, from
that time ; so that he did not cohabit with his wife till 1611,

CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

467

The names of Trinculo and Antonio, two of the
characters in this comedy, are likewise found in that
of Albumazar ; which was printed in 1614, but is
supposed by Dryden to have appeared some years
before.

Ben Jonson, in the Induction to his Bartholomew
Fair, has endeavoured to depreciate this beautiful
comedy by calling it a foolery [drollery]. Dryden,
however, informs us that it was a very popular play
at Blackfriars, but unluckily has not said a word
relative to the time of its first representation there,
though he might certainly have received information
on that subject from Sir William D'Avenant.

If the dates here assigned to our author's plays
should not, in every instance, bring with them con-
viction of their propriety, let it be remembered, that
this is a subject on which conviction cannot at this
day be obtained ; and that the observations now sub-
mitted to the publick, do not pretend to any higher
title than that of " An Attempt to ascertain the
Chronology of the Dramas of Shakspeare."

Should the errors and deficiencies of this essay
invite others to deeper and more successful researches,
the end proposed by it will be attained : and he who
offers the present arrangement of Shakspeare's dramas,
will be happy to transfer the slender portion of credit
that may result from the novelty of his undertaking,
to some future claimant, who may be supplied with
ampler materials and endued with a superior degree
of antiquarian sagacity.

2 H 2

468 CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER.

To some, he is not unapprized, this inquiry will
appear a tedious and barren speculation. But there
are many, it is hoped, who think nothing which
relates to the brightest ornament of the English
nation, wholly uninteresting ; who will be gratified
by observing, how the genius of our great poet gra-
dually expanded itself, till, like his own Ariel, it
Jlamed amazement in every quarter, blazing forth
with a lustre that has not hitherto been equalled,
and probably will never be surpassed \

3 In the list of plays enumerated (p. 438), by Mr. Malone as
unpublished, he might have excepted two more of them which
still remain in manuscript, viz. The Queen of Corsica and the
Bugbears, both also in the collection of the Marquis of Lans-
downe. The following is the list of plays formerly in the posses-
sion of Mr. Warburton, copied from his MS. in the collection
of the same nobleman :

" The Honourable Loves, by Will. Rowley.

" Henry the First, by Will. Shakespear and Robert Davenport.

*^ The Fair Favourite.

" Minerva's Sacrifice. Phill. Massinger.

** Duke Humphrey. Will. Shakespear.

" Citty Shuffler.

" Sir John Suckling's Workes.

" Nothing impossible to Love. T. P. Sir Rob. le Greece.
" The Forc'd Lady. T. Phill. Massinger.
" The Governor. T. Sir Corn. Formido.
The Lovers of Loodgate.
The Flying Voice, by R. Wood.
** The Mayden's Holaday, by Christ. Marlowe.
" The Puritan Maid, the Modest Wife, and the Wanton
Widow, by Tho. Middleton.

*' The London Merchant, a Comedy, by Jo. Ford.
«' The King of Swedland*.

* Query, if not Dekker's King of Swethland, entered on the
Stationers' books, June 29, 1660.

LIFE OF WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 469

SECTION XVL

[It is with deep regret, in which the reader, I have
no douht, will participate, that here that portion of

" Love hath found out his Eyes, byTho. Jorden.

** Antonio and Vallia, by Phill. Massinger.

*' The Duchess of Fernandina. T. Henry Glapthorne.

*' Jocondo and Astolso, byTho. Decker.

" St. George for England, by Will. Smithe.

** The Parliament of Love, by Wm. Rowley.

The Widow's Prise. C. Will. Sampson.

The Inconstant Lady. Wm. Wilson.
*' The Woman's Plott. Phill. Massinger.

The Crafty Marshall. C. Shack. Marmion.
*' An Interlude, by Ra. Wood, (worth nothing.)
*' The Tyrant, a Tragedy, by Phill. Massinger.
" The Nonesuch, a C. Wm. Rowley.

The Royal Combate. C. By Jo. Forde.
" Philenzo and Hippolito. C. Phill. Massinger.
** Beauty in a Trance, Mr. Jo. Forde.
*' The Judge. C. By Phill. Massinger.
*' A good Beginning may have a good End, by Jo. Forde,
** Fast and welcome, by Phill. Massinger.
" Believe as you list. C. By Phill. Massinger.
*' Hist, of Jobe, by Robt. Green.
** The Vestall, a Tragedy, by H. Glapthorne.
** Yorkshire Gentlewoman and her Sons.
" The Honour of Women. C. by P. Massinger.

The Noble Choice. T. C. P. Massinger.
*' A Mask. R. Govell.

*' Second Maiden's Tragedy. George Chapman,
" The Great Man.

The Spanish Puechas. C.

The Queen of Corsica. T. By F. Jaques.
*' The Tragedy of Jobe. (Good.)
*' The Nobleman. T. C. Cyrill Tourneur.
** A Play by Will. Shakspeare.
*' Bugbears. C. Jo. Geffrey.

470

THE LIFE OF

the Life of Shakspeare which Mr. Malone had pre-
pared for the press is brought to a close ; and conse-
" Orpheus. C,

*' 'Tis good sleeping in a whole Skin. W. Wager.
'* Faery Queen.

*' After I had been many years collecting these MS. plays,
through my own carelessness and the ignorance of my servant in
whose hands I had lodged them, they were unluckily burn'd, or
put under pye-bottoms, excepting the three which follow :

" Second Maiden's Tragedy.

*• Bugbears.

"Queen of Corsica. J. Warburton."

Since the foregoing elaborate, and, for the most part, satis-
factory result of a laborious enquiry was last published [in 1790],
the order of the plays of Shakspeare, as settled by Mr. Malone,
has been controverted by Mr. Chalmers, who has formed a new
arrangement ; and in support of it has produced his evidence and
assigned his reasons. To these (being too long to be here in-
serted) the reader is referred for farther satisfaction. On a sub-
ject which both parties admit does not pretend to the certainties
of demonstration, a difference of opinion may be expected. Time,
research, and accident, may yet bring to light evidence to confirm
or confute either party's statement. The arrangement of Mr.
Malone being already before the reader it will be necessary to
add that of Mr. Chalmers ; and that a judgment may be formed
which claims the preference, both lists are subjoined. The first
is by Mr. Chalmers, the second by Mr. Malone.

1. The Comedy of Errors.. 1591 — 1593

2. Love's Labour's Lost 1592 — 1594

3. Romeo and Juliet 1592 — 1595

4. Henry VI. the First Part 1593 — 1589

5. Henry VI. the Second Part 1595 — - 1591

6. Henry VI. the Third Part 1595 — 1591

7. The Two Gentlemen of Verona 1595 — 1595

8. Richard III 1595 — 1597

9. Richard II 1596 — 1597

10. The Merry Wives of Windsor 1596 — 1601

11. Henry IV. the First Part 1596 — 1597

12. Henry IV. the Second Part 1597 — 1598

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

471

quently it has devolved upon me to arrange, as well as
I am able, those particulars which I have been able
to collect from his papers, and to incorporate them
with those facts and statements which have hitherto
been appended to the life of the poet by Mr. Rowe.
Wherever it is possible, I shall give Mr. Malone's

IS, Henry V 1597 — 1599

U. The Merchant of Venice 1597 — 1598

15. Hamlet 1597 — 1596

16. King John 1598 — 1596

17. A Midsummer-Night's Dream 1598 — 1592

18. The Taming of the Shrew 1598 — 15945

19. All's Well That Ends Well 1599 — 1598

20. Much Ado About Nothing 1599 — 1600

21. As You Like It 1599 — 1600

22. Troilus and Cressida 1600 — 1602

23. Timon of Athens 1601 — 1609

24. The Winter's Tale 1601 — 1604

25. Measure for Measure * 1604 — 1603

26. Lear 1605 — 1605

27. Cymbeline 1606 — 1605

28. Macbeth 1606 — 1606

29. Julius Caesar 1607 — 1607

30. Antony and Cleopatra 1608 — 1608

31. Coriolanus 1609 — 1610

32. The Tempest 1613 — 1612

33. The Twelfth-Night 1613 — 1614

34. Henry VIII 1613 — 1601

35. Othello 1614 — 1611

See Supplemental Apology for the Believers in the Shakspeare
Papers. By George Chalmers, F. R. S. A. S. p. 266. Reed.

Dr. Drake, in his work entitled Shakspeare and the Times, has
proposed an arrangement in some instances different from both
Mr. Chalmers and Mr. Malone. The list taken from Mr. Malone
is that which appeared in 1790. I have allowed it to remain, that
the reader may have it in his power to compare it with his subse-
quent opinions. Bos well.

472

THE LIFE OF

memoranda in his own words. That they are not
more numerous, is much to be lamented ; but, from
the scattered state in which his papers were kept, a
number of curious matters of research, are, I fear,
irrecoverably lost. Among these is the account he
seems to have promised of Shakspeare's brother
Edmund, of whom I find no mention but the
register of his burial, which Mr. Chalmers has
already laid before the publick in his Additions to
the History of the Stage. It is, at the same time,
a subject of congratulation, that he had proceeded
thus far; and has shown, by an examination of
the legendary tales which have so long been cur-
rent respecting Shakspeare's early years, that they are
wholly groundless ; and that the greatest genius which
his country has produced, maintained, from his youth
upwards, that respectability of character which un-
questionably belonged to him in after life.]

After the discussion wiiich has already been gone
through respecting the probable order in which those
dramas which were entirely written by Shakspeare
were produced, it becomes necessary to mention two
others, which have been admitted into the collection
of his works, from a notion that they received some |
improvements from his pen — Pericles, and Titus
Andronicus. Respecting the first, there appears to
have been no doubt entertained by the numerous
criticks who have delivered their opinions on this
drama, that the hand of our great poet is clearly
discernible in many parts of it, Vvhile the remainder
is altogether unworthy of his genius. Mr. Malone
was, at one period, indeed, inclined to attribute the

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 473

whole to him, but was subsequently convinced of his
error, and acknowledged it with that candour and
love of truth by which he was invariably influenced.
Titus Andronicus is also still suffered to retain its
place, from the same notion, that Shakspeare had
mingled a few brilliant passages of his own with the
baser mattei" of which it is generally formed. Of this,
which I cannot but think a very questionable theory,
the reader is left to form his own judgment. Five
other plays have been printed under his name, in the
folio 1664, which have not the slightest claim to
such a distinction — Locrine, Sir John Oldcastle, Lord
Cromwell, The London Prodigal, The Puritan. A
sixth, The Yorkshire Tragedy, was pronounced by
Mr. Steevens, when it was republished by Mr.
Malone, in his Supplement, to have been a hasty
performance by Shakspeare. This opinion he seems,
however, to have silently abandoned; and it has
since been deservedly consigned to the same neglect
with the rest. If internal evidence were not sufficient
to prove that dramas so utterly worthless had been
absurdly ascribed to so great a name, we are fur-
nished by the Henslowe MSS., which the reader will
find in the third volume, with satisfactory informa-
tion respecting one of them, namely, Sir John Old-
castle, from which it appears that it was the produc-
tion of four writers — Munday, Drayton, Wilson, and
Hathway. See vol. iii. p. 329. Some other plays,
with about equal pretensions, have also been given to
our author — The Arraignment of Paris, The Birth of
Merhn, Edward III., Fair Emma, The Merry Devil
of Edmonton, and Mucedorus. Of these, The
Arraignment of Paris is known to have been written

474

^ THE LIFE OF

by George Peele : The Birth of JMerHn, by Rowley ;
although it is said in the title-page, 1662, probably
by a fraud of the bookseller, to be the joint production
of that dramatist and Shakspeare. Edward the
Third was said to be Shakspeare's, by Mr. Capell,
confessedly upon no ground but his opinion that no
one else, at that period, could have written it. It is
found in that gentleman's Prolusions, 1760. Fair
Emma rests upon no authority whatever. The Merry
Devil of Edmonton was entered on the Stationers*
books, by H. Mosely, about the time of the Restora-
tion, as Shakspeare's ; but there is a former entry, in
1608, in which it is said to be written by T. B,
whom Mr. Malone conjectures to have been Tony or
Antony Brewer. Mucedorus, he thinks, was the pro*
duction of Robert Greene. Shakspeare has also been
supposed to have had a share in two other dramas, in
which, if we should adopt that notion, he was asso-
ciated with two highly distinguished contemporaries.
He is said to have assisted Jonson in Sejanus ; and
Fletcher, in The Two Noble Kinsmen. His con-
nection with Jonson rests only on tradition ; for,
although that poet has mentioned a coadjutor, he has
not recorded his name ; and Mr. GifFord is disposed
to question whether Shakspeare was the person to
whom he has alluded ; and as the passages supplied
by this nameless friend were omitted when this piece
was published, we have no opportunity of judging
from internal evidence. A very considerable differ-
ence of opinion has prevailed with regard to The Two
Noble Kinsmen. Mr. Steevens's sentiments on this
subject are given at large in a note at the conclusion
of Pericles, where it is incidentally introduced ; and

WILLIAM SIIAKSPEARE.

475

if the reader wishes for a further discussion of the
question, it will be found in Mr. Weber's edition of
Beaumont and Fletcher. If I might venture to
mingle in a contest which has called forth some very
distinguished names, on either side, I should have no
hesitation in expressing my disbelief of Shakspeare's
co-operation. I can see no such similarity of style,
as some criticks have thought they discovered ; and
the madness of the Jailor's daughter, which has been
compared with that of Ophelia, would alone be suffi-
cient to convince me that two such different represen-
tations of frenzy could not have proceeded from the
same pen. Shakspeare's madness could no more be
equalled than his magick. Fletcher seems to have
had little notion of a deranged mind, except that of
making a female talk obscenely. Mr. Weber thinks
the description of the death of Arcite decidedly in
Shakspeare's manner. I should be sorry to admit
this observation to be just. The opening of this
jspeech appears to me to be deplorably frigid :

'* List then, your cousin,

** Mounted, upon a steed that family
** Did first bestow on him, a black one, owing
** Not a hair worth of white, which some will say
*' Weakens his price, and many will not buy
" His goodness with this note : which superstition
^* Here finds allowance ; on this horse is Arcite,
** Trotting the stones of Athens, which the calkins
*' Did rather tell than trample ; for the horse
** Would make his length a mile iPt pleased his rider
*' To put pride in him. As he thus went courting
*' The flinty pavement, dancing as 'twere to the musick
** His own hoofs made {foTj as they say, from iron
Came musick's origin), what envious flint,

476

THE LIFE OF

" Cold as old Saturn, and, like him, possess'd
*' With fire malevolent, darted a spark,
•* Or what fierce sulphur else, to this end made,
** I comment not," &c.

Surely in this there is nothing Shakspearian. If
Dr. Donne had undertaken to write a tragedy, he
could not have introduced into it any thing more
thoroughly unsuited to a description of this nature
than the whimsical parenthesis about the origin of
musick.

But the poetry of Shakspeare was by no means
confined to the drama. There are other productions
of his muse, which, notwithstanding the contemp-
tuous manner in which they are spoken of by Mr.
Steevens, were the subjects of high admiration
among his contemporaries. A collection of his
sonnets was published at so late a period as 1609 ;
but they are mentioned by Meres, in 1598, and bear
evident marks of being early compositions. The
time at which they were written cannot be accurately
ascertained ; and the question as to their date must
materially depend upon the judgment which the
reader may form as to the topicks which they were
meant to embrace, and the circumstances by which
they were suggested. Of these, a discussion will be
found in the twentieth volume of this work, where
they are carefully reprinted, with all the illustrations
which his commentators could supply. The Lover's
Complaint was appended to our author's sonnets in
1609 ; and The Passionate Pilgrim was printed with
his name, by William Jaggard, in 1599. Two other
poems remain to be mentioned, which were un-

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

477

questionably of an early date : his Venus and Adonis
which was first committed to the press in 1593, and his
Rape of Lucrece, which was published in the following
year. The intrinsick merit of these poems, of which
the first long retained its popularity among youthful
readers ; and the second, which, as we are informed by
Gabriel Harvey, was estimated so highly by persons of
a graver description, that it was placed in the same
rank with Hamlet ; would be sufficient to recommend
them to our attention : but they derive an additional
interest from being dedicated to ouf poet's amiable
patron. Lord Southampton, in the only prose compo-
sitions of Shakspeare not in a dramatick form, which
have come down to us. Of this accomplished noble-
man, a short memoir is given in the twentieth volume
of this edition ; but those particulars which more im-
mediately relate to his connection with the poet, are
reserved for this place. Lord Southampton's attach-
ment to theatrical entertainments is strongly pointed
out by a letter from Rowland Whyte to Sir Robert
Sidney, dated in the latter part of the year 1599,
which is preserved in the Sidney Papers, vol. ii.
p. 132 : " My Lord Southampton, and Lord Rut-
land, came not to the court [at Nonsuch]. The one
doth but very seldom. They pass away the time in
London merely in going to plaies every day'' A cir-
cumstance in his personal history may have given him
this bias, and may also have been the means of intro-
ducing Shakspeare to his acquaintance. His mother,
the Countess Dowager Southampton, was married, pro-
bably before 1580, to a second husband, Sir Thomas
Heneage, who had long been Treasurer of the

478

THE LIFE OF

Chambers to the Queen, an office by which he was,
in some sort, connected with the stage ; all the pay-
ments made to the several companies of comedians
then in being, for plays exhibited at court, belonging
to his department. It is not an improbable supposi-
tion that Shakspeare, even then being distinguished
for the decorum and propriety of his conduct and
manners, may have been deputed by his company to
wait upon the treasurer, and receive his commands.
Lord Southampton would, of course, be a frequent
visiter at his mother's, and would thus have an
opportunity of being thrown in the way of the young
ingenious, but modest and unassuming poet. This
circumstance, combined with the high character
which the Earl had acquired, even at that early age,
might have induced Shakspeare to solicit his patron-
age for the first heir of his invention, the poem of
Venus and Adonis, which was published in the year
1593, when he himself was only twenty-nine, and
his patron had not yet attained his twentieth year.

Even at so early an age, the Earl of Southampton
was distinguished for his love of literature and his
patronage of literary men. His liberality to the
votaries of the muses is celebrated by Barnaby
Barnes ' in a sonnet addressed to him in the very year
when Shakspeare's first poem appeared, in which he

* Barnaby Barnes, whose birth was more respectable than his
poetry, was a younger son of Dr. Richard Barnes, Bishop of
Durham. He was bred at Brazen-nose College in Oxford, of
which he became a member in 1586. He published a Collection
of Poems, entitled Parthenophil and Parthenope, among which
is the sonnet above-mentioned, which is a very poor thing. He

WILLIAM SIIAKSPEAEE.

479

expresses a hope that his verses " if graced by that
heavenly countenance which gives light to the muses"
may be able to resist the malignant shafts of envy.
About the same time, the ingenious Thomas Nash,
then rising into reputation as a novellist and a sati-
rical writer, has dedicated to him one of his tracts ^ ;
and not long afterwards he is mentioned with respect
by Camden and Jervais Markham, the latter of
whom, in a sonnet prefixed to his poem on the death
of Sir Richard Grenville, alludes to the high character
he had already acquired as a patron of poets ; and if
I mistake not, to the countenance he had shown to
the productions of Shakspeare^. But the most
honourable testimony to his merit, is given by Shak-
speare himself in the two Dedications which I have
already mentioned ; in both of which we find evident
marks of that ingenuous modesty, for which our great
poet throughout his life was eminently distinguished.
That Shakspeare partook of this nobleman's bounty,
there can be no reason to doubt ; and if we could
give credit to a story which comes down to us, resting,
as it is said, upon the authority of Sir WilHam
D'Avenant, he was at one time the object of unex-

afterwards (1607) produced a tragedy called The Devil's
Charter.

^ The Unfortunate Traveller, or the Life of Jacke Wilton,
4to. 1594^. But, at the conclusion of the piece, we find
"June 27, 1593."

3 Markham's sonnet to Lord Southampton, prefixed to The
Most Honorable Tragedie of Sir Richard Grenvile, Knight, 16mo.
1595, begins thus :

*' Othou, the laurel of the Muses hill,
" Whose eyes doth crown the most victorious pe?i/'
3

478

THE LIFE OF

ampled munificence, having received from him in one
sum no less than a thousand pounds, to enable him
to complete a purchase he was desirous of making.
This anecdote, like many others, which I have had
occasion to examine, had probably some foundation
in truth, though it has since been extravagantly
exaggerated. That he gave him a thousand pounds,
which is at least equivalent to five thousand at this
day, in order that he might complete a purchase, is
totally unworthy of credit, since no such extensive pur-
chase ever appears to have been made by him, as mil be
seen when we come to make an estimate of the pro-
perty which he possessed. It is much more likely
that he might have presented the poet with an hun-
dred pounds in return for his Dedications ; a gift,
which, although not calculated to excite so much asto-
nishment, was worthy of that generous nobleman's
liberality. But it was not in Lord Southampton
alone that Shakspeare found a patron ; he appears
to have enjoyed the approbation and favour of two
successive monarchs. Queen Elizabeth, who was at
all times attached to theatrical entertainments, had
the good taste to appreciate the talents of that great
poet whose genius has shed so much lustre on her
reign ; and, if tradition may be believed, was so much
delighted with the character of Falstaff as it had
been already depicted in the two parts of Henry IV.
that she wished to see him represented as a lover, and
it is to the royal commands that we are indebted for
one of his most perfect comedies, The Merry Wives
of Windsor. Her successor was not less friendly to
the stage, nor less blind to the merits of its greatest

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

481

ornament. We have been told, upon authority which
there is no reason to doubt, that he wrote a letter to
Shakspeare with his own hand ; the story is told in
the advertisement to Lintot's edition of Shakspeare's
poems, no date, but printed in 1710. The letter is
there said to have been lost, but formerly to have
been in the possession of Sir William Davenant, " as
a credible person now living can testify." The person
thus described, we learn from Mr. Oldys's MS.
Additions to Fuller's Worthies, was Sheffield Duke
of Buckingham, who was told it by Davenant him-
self This letter is with great probability supposed
by Dr. Farmer to have been written in return for the
compliment paid to him in Macbeth

In a manuscript volume of poems, which I lately purchased
out of a bookseller's catalogue, written apparently about the
time of the Restoration, I find the following article ; valeat quan-
tum valere potest :

" Shakespeare upon the King.
*' Crownes have their compasse, length of dayes their date,
*' Triumphes their tombs, felicity her fate :
** Of more then earth cann earth make none partaker
" But knowledge makes the king most like his Maker."

The same miscellany contains a copy of verses by his Majesty
himself, which, perhaps, the reader may think contains more in-
ternal evidence of being the genuine production of the royal poet
than can be found for attributing those lines, which I have quoted,
to Shakspeare.

" King James upon the Death of Queen Anne.
*' Thee to invite the greate God sent his starre
*• Whose friends and nearest kin good princes are
*' For though they run the race of men and dye
" Death seems but to refine their Majestie
VOL. II. 2 I

482

THE LIFE OF

Fostered by such honourable and distinguished
patronage, and acting at the same time under the

*' So did my Queene from hence her court remoove

And leave the earth to bee enthroned above
" Then she is changed not dead. No good prince dyes
" But only lyke the sun doth set to rise."

Whatever may have been the foibles of this monarch, v^^e can-
not but contemplate him with respect, as the patron of Shak-
speare ; and, therefore, I shall make no apology for adding an-
other specimen of his poetry, which appears to me to possess
considerable merit. It was transcribed, by Mr. Malone, from a
MS. in the Rawlinson collection, Bodleian Library :

" A Poem made by King James upon the Voyage of his sonne
Charles and the Marquisse Buckingham into Spayne March
1622."

[In order to understand the names made use of in these
verses, it should be recollected that the Prince and Buckingham
travelled in disguise, under the borrowed names of Thomas and
John Smith. Sir H. Wotton's Life and Death of G. Villiers,
Duke of Buckingham."]

" What sudden change hath dark't of late
*' The glory of th' Arcadian state ?
" The fleecy flockes refuse to feede,
The lambes to play, the ewes to breede :
** The altars smoke, the ofFringes burne
" Till Jack and Tom doe safe return.

" The spring neglects her course to keepe
" The ayre with mightie stormes doth weep *
*' The prety birdes disdaine to singe
" The meades to smell the woods to springe

" The mountaines droppe, the fountaynes mourne

" Till Jack and Tom doe safe returne.

* This is not a poetical fiction. There was a violent storm at
this time, by which the Prince was shipwrecked, and forced to
land at St, Andrews. See Waller's Poems. Malone.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 483

guidance of his own good sense, he appears at an

*• What may it bee that moves this woe?
*' Whose want afFectes Arcadia soe ?
*' The hope of Greece, the proppe of arts
*' Was princely Jack, the joy of harts

** And Tom was to our royal Pan

" The chiefest swayne, and truest man.

" The lofty trees of Menalus
** Did shake with winde from Hesperus :
*' Whose sweete delicious ayre did fly
*' Through all the boundes of Arcadie

" Which moved a vayne in Jack and Tom

" To see the coast it issued from.

*' The winde was love, which princes stout
*' To pages turnes ; but who can doubt

Where equall fortune love procures
*' And equall love successe assures

*' But venturous Jack will bring to Greece

" The best of prize, the golden fleece.

*' Love is a world of many Spaynes

" Where coldest hilles and hottest playnes

*' With barren rockes and fertile fields

** By turnes despayre and comfort yeilds
"But who can doubt of prosperous luck
" Where love and fortune doth conduct.

Thy grandsire, godsire, father too,
" Were thine examples so to doe ;
*' Their brave attempts in heate of love,

France, Scotland, Denmarke did approve

" So Jack, and Tom, doe nothing new,

'* When love, and fortune, they pursue.

** Kind shepheards that have loved them long,
** Bee not too rash in censuring wrong :
'* Correct your feares leave of [oft] to mourne
*' The heavens shall favour their returne
Commit the care to Royall Pan
" Of Jacke his sonne and Tom his man." Boswell.
2 I 2

484

THE LIFE OF

early period to have placed himself in circumstances
of ease and comfort. It must he gratifying to every
reader to reflect upon this, and to feel satisfied that
one to whonfi mankind has been so largely indebted
for the pleasure and instruction which his writings
have afforded, was not, while he was administering
to the delight of others, himself labouring under the
pressure of poverty. It will at the same time supply
a satisfactory confutation of that maxim which the
idle and profligate are so eager to inculcate, that
economy and prudence are neither to be expected nor
required in a person of exalted genius. If any man
was ever entitled to such an exemption, it was Shak-
speare. What poet's eye, in a fine phrenzy rolling,
might with a better plea have overlooked the petty
details of life ; but while it was glancing from heaven
to earth, from earth to heaven, he was not unmindful
that he had duties as a husband and a father to per-
form. We have seen him quitting Stratford, cer-
tainly not under the degrading circumstances which
unauthorized tradition has handed down, but, as we
have every reason to suppose, from what has been
related of his father, involved in some degree in pecu-
niary difiiculties ; and we shall find him at the close
of life leaving his family in a state of comparative
aflluence. As early as the year 1598, an application
was made to him for a loan of thirty pounds, no
inconsiderable sum in those days, by his countryman
Richard Quyney of Stratford, who was beyond a
doubt the father of Thomas Quyney, who afterwards
married our poet's youngest daughter. Such a request
could not have been made to a person who was not

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

485

possessed of means which enabled him readily to
comply with it ; and it is expressed in terms which
clearly show that the writer was satisfied that he was
addressing one from whom he had no apprehension
of receiving a churlish denial. As the letter is a
curiosity in itself, and derives an interest from its
relation to Shakspeare, I shall here insert it.

" Loving Contryman, I am bolde of yo"^. as of a
frende, craveing yo"' helpe w*'' xxx'^ uppon M'
Bushell & my securytee, or M' Myttens with me.
M' Rosswell is not come to London, as yeate, & I
have especiall cawse. Yo"^. shall frende me muche in
helpeing me out of all the debeits I owe in London I
thanck god, and muche quiet to my mynde w*'"'.
wolde not be indebited. I am now towards the
Cowrte in hope y' answer for the dispatche of my
Buysenes. Yo"' shall nether loose creddytt nor
monney by me, the Lorde wyllinge; & nowe butt
pswade yo"' selfe soe as I hope & yo'"" shall nott need
to feare but with all hartie thanckfullnes I wyll holde
my tyme & content yo"^" frend, & yf we Bargaine
farther, yo"" shall be thepaie m' yo"' selfe. My tyme
bidds me to hasten to an ende, & soe I coihitt thys
[to] yo""' care & hope of yo'"' helpe. I feare I shall
nott be backe this night from the Cowrte. haste, the
Lorde be w"' yo"^ & w*'' us all. amen, ffrom the Bell
in Carter Lane the 25 October 1598.

" Yo"^'^ in all kyndenes,

" Ryc. Quyney.

" To my Loveing good frend
& contryman W"
Shackespe^ thees."

486

THE LIFE OF

In looking at this document, which, when folded up,
is hardly two inches square, it is impossible not to
express an unavailing regret that while this minute
memorial of an obscure bailiff of Stratford has
come down to us after the lapse of two centuries unin-
jured by the accidents of time, we are not in possession
of a single manuscript from the pen of his illustrious
correspondnet, although they must have been un-
questionably voluminous. Independently of his plays,
a man of his kindness of heart and friendly dispo-
sition, must have been perpetually engaged in ami-
cable intercourse with his family, from whom he ap-
pears to have been separated a great part of the year ;
and those many individuals attached to him in his
native town, for which he always seems to have
retained his fondness, and which at the close of his
publick labours he gladly selected as the spot where
he might close his days in the society of those who
were dear to him. In the following year, we have
another and gratifying instance of his prosperity, in a
grant of arms made to his family, which I have
already expressed my belief was obtained by his father
in consequence of the poet's celebrity. What share
he held in the theatre at an early period, we have no
means of ascertaining with accuracy ; but in 1603, on
King James's accession to the throne, a licence was
granted to the Globe company, in which Shakspeare

3 Shackespe.] Mr. Malone has here furnished an authority
against his own hypothesis, with regard to the ancient mode of
spelling the poet's name ; but I think erroneously. What he has
made an in his transcript, appears to my eye, in the original,
to be only a slight flourish to the k. Bo swell.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

487

is particularly mentioned as one of the partners.
The pecuniary benefit which he derived from this
situation, as well as a more particular mention of
the purchases which he made at various times, will be
subsequently noticed when an estimate is made of
the property which he left behind him at his death.
From the lamentable neglect of those whose proximity
to the time in which he lived might have supplied them
with ample contemporary information, little is known,
either of his habits or associates, during the time that
he resided in London ; but from all which we can
generally collect, there can be no reason to question
that the gentle Shakspeare enjoyed the society of all
the most accomplished men that adorned the period
in which he lived. The patronage of Lord South-
ampton, the favour of the court, his own splendid
genius and amiable manners, must have made his
company sought after by all who were distinguished
for their rank or their literature.

[I have prefixed a bracket to the observations which
follow, because I am by no means satisfied that what
I am going to add would have met with the concur-
rence of Mr. Malone, and I am anxious not to mis-
lead the publick by seeming to impute to him sen-
timents which it may be doubtful if he ever could
have been persuaded to entertain ; but I think we
have every reason to suppose that one of those with
whom he lived upon a footing of particular intimacy,
was his great contemporary, Ben Jonson. Whether
at any time there was even a temporary interruption
of their cordiality is a question to which I have ad-
verted elsewhere. One anecdote has been handed

488

THE LIFE OF

down by tradition, which, although certainly not true
in all its parts, I should be unwilling to think
altogether destitute of foundation. It has been
stated that the acquaintance of these two great
poets began with an act of kindness on the part of
Shakspeare, on the perusal of a play by Jonson,
who was then unknown, which had been super-
ciliously rejected by the players; but that Shak-
speare having accidentally seen it, not only pointed
out its merit, but took every opportunity of recom-
mending Jonson's writings to the publick. The play
has been said to have been Every Man in his Hu-
mour, which, till the publication of Henslowe's MSS.
by Mr. Malone, was supposed to have been Jonson s
earliest production. That he was not then unknown,
and that the drama alluded to was not performed at
Shakspeare's theatre, is placed beyond a doubt by
the MSS. above-mentioned. Mr. Malone and Mr.
GifFord concur in disbelieving this story ; yet it has
more than once been observed by my late friend,
that traditionary anecdotes, however erroneous, in
many respects, have not unfrequently some foun-
dation in truth ; and one would sm*ely be gratified in
believing that an incident which does honour to both
those illustrious men was of this description. Jonson
was certainly at an early period employed on the
drama ; but how unworthily was he often called upon
to exert his talents ! It is impossible to contemplate,
without commiseration, this profound and judicious
scholar with all his classical attainments fresh about
him, ambitious of teaching laws to the stage, which
was then, generally speaking, in the lowest state of

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

489

degradation, not only compelled to unite himself
with other writers altogether unworthy of such an
association ; but driven to the necessity of earning
thirty shillings by writing additions to the Spanish
Tragedy, a performance which he never speaks of
but with the utmost contempt. His Comedy of
Humours, as it is called in the MS. was indeed per-
formed, and, as it should seem, with success, having
been acted eleven times ; but is it too much to sup-
pose that it may afterwards have been purchased by
Shakspeare's company at his instigation, and that
the praises which he bestowed upon it, may have
advanced the author's reputation ?

It is true that at the time when this admirable
comedy was written, Jonson, as he terms it in his
Dedication to the Gentlemen of the Inns of Court,
had friendship with divers in those societies who
were great names in learning, and of such men it
will be readily believed that Every Man in his Hu-
mour was not despised. But although he was very
far from being unknown by men of learned and cul-
tivated minds ; yet his play might have been " ca-
viare to the general," before whom Locrine and old
Jeronymo were exhibited with applause. Shak-
speare, from his theatrical influence, might be more
capable of promoting its success than the Gentlemen
of the Inns of Court, nor is it any deduction from
Jonson's genius that the master spirit of the age
was among the first who appreciated and pointed it
out. I confess I do not feel confident on this sub-
ject; but after Mr. GifFordhas successfully overthrown
the long prevalent stories of the hostility which sub-

490

THE LIFE OF

sisted between these two great men, I cannot but
regret if at the same time we are compelled to relin-
quish an anecdote which exhibits them in friendly
intercourse.]

The exact period at which Shakspeare quitted the
metropolis, and settled at his native place, has not
been ascertained. Mr. Malone was at one time of
opinion that this alteration in his mode of life took
place soon after his dramatick labours closed, in 1611
or 1612 ; but a doubt was thrown upon this conjec-
ture by the discovery of a mortgage which was
executed by Shakspeare in March, 1612-13 ; and
which will be found in the Appendix. He may,
however, as has already been observed in a former
page, have parted with his property in the theatre
before ; and it may be added, that this transaction
may have taken place after he had ceased to be a
settled resident in London. All the accounts which
have been handed down to us, concur in stating that
he spent some years in Stratford before his death ;
and as that event took place in April, 1616, we cannot
with propriety fix upon a later date than what has
been already mentioned for the period of his retire-
ment. But as his family lived at Stratford, as it
should seem, during the whole or the greater part of
the time when his connection with the theatre required
his attendance in the metropolis ; we might readily
infer from his character, that he would not totally
absent himself from those who were dear to him ; and
accordingly we are told by Aubrey, that he used to
visit his native country once a year. That accurate
observation of nature and endless variety of character

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 491

which appears throughout his works, could not have
been obtained but by a man who did not suffer a
single circumstance of " many-coloured life" to escape
him; and it is probable that not a journey took place
which did not supply him with fresh materials ; and
of this an instance has been recorded by Mr. Aubrey:
" The humour of the constable in A Midsommer-
Night-Dreame (he tells us) he happened to take at
Crendon in Bucks (I think it was Midsomer-night
that he happened to be there) ; which is the road from
London to Stratford ; and there was living that con-
stable about 1642, when I came first to Oxon. Mr.
Josias Howe ^ is of the parish, and knew him."

It must be acknowledged that there is here a slight
mistake, there being no such character as a constable
in A Midsummer-Night's Dream. The person in
contemplation probably was Dogberry in Much Ado
About Nothing. But this mistake of a name does
not, in my apprehension, detract in the smallest
degree from the credit of the fact itself ; namely, that
our poet in his admirable character of a foolish con-
stable had in view an individual who lived in
Crendon or Grendon (for it is written both ways), a
town in Buckinghamshire, about thirteen miles from
Oxford. Leonard Digges, who was Shakspeare's
contemporary, has fallen into a similar err our ; for in
his eulogy on our poet, he has supposed the character

^ •* Josias Howe, the son of Thomas Howe, priest, of Grendon
in Bucks, was matriculated as a student of Trinity College, Ox-
ford, April 13, 1632, aged nineteen. About the same time, scho-
lar." A. W. in MS. This shews he was born not in 1611, as
Mr. Warton supposed, but in 1613.

492

THE LIFE OF

of Malvolio, which is found in Twelfth Night, to be
in Much Ado About Nothing.

As some account of the person from whom Mr.
Aubrey derived this anecdote, who was of the same
college with him at Oxford, may tend to establish its
credit, I shall transcribe from Mr. War ton's preface
to his Life of Sir Thomas Pope, such notices of Mr.
Josias Howe, as he has been able to recover.

" He was born at Crendon in Bucks [about the
year 1611], and elected a scholar of Trinity College
June 12, 1632 ; admitted a fellow, being then
bachelor of arts. May 26, 1637. By Hearne he is
called a great cavalier and loyalist, and a most inge-
nious man ^. He appears to have been a general and
accomplished scholar, and in polite literature one of
the ornaments of the university. — In 1644, he
preached before king Charles the First, at Christ
Church cathedral, Oxford. The sermon was printed,
and in red letters, by his Majesty's special command.
— Soon after 1646, he was ejected from his fellowship
by the presbyterians ; and restored in 1660. He
lived forty-two years, greatly respected, after his
restitution, and arriving at the age of ninety, died
fellow of the college where he constantly resided,
August 28, 1701." Mr. Thomas Howe, the father
of this Mr. Josias Howe (as I learn from Wood),
was minister of Grendon, and contemporary with
Shakspeare ; and from him his son perhaps derived
some information concerning our poet, which he
might have communicated to his fellow-collegian,
Aubrey. The anecdote relative to the constable of

7 Rob. Glouc. Gloss, p. 669.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 493

Grendon, however, does not stand on this ground ;
for we find that Mr. Josias Howe personally knew
him, and that he was living in 1642.

When our poet returned to his native place, we
might have heen led to hope that his townsmen, who
doubtless participated in no common degree in the
high admiration which his writings had excited,
would have preserved some memorials of the domestic
life and habits of one who had conferred so much
honour on the spot of his birth. But although in
this we are disappointed, his contemporaries have
borne witness in general terms to the brilliancy of
his conversation and the suavity of his manners.

" He was," says Aubrey, " a handsome well-shaped
man, verie good company, and of a very ready, and
pleasant, and smooth witt."

I suppose none of my readers will find any difficulty
in giving full credit to this part of the account. Mr.
Aubrey, I believe, is the only writer who has parti-
cularly mentioned the beauty of our poet's person ;
and there being no contradictory testimony on the
subject, he may here be safely relied on. All his
contemporaries who have spoken of him, concur in
celebrating the gentleness of his manners, and the
readiness of his wit. " As he was a happy imitator
of nature (say his fellow comedians), so was he a
most gentle expresser of it. His mind and hand
went together ; and what he thought he uttered with
that easiness, that we have scarce received from him
a blot in his papers." " My gentle Shakspeare," is
the compellation used to him by Ben Jonson. " He
was indeed (says his old antagonist) honest, and of

494

THE LIFE OF

an open and free nature ; had an excellent fancy,
brave notions, and gentle expressions ; wherein he
flowed with that facility, that sometimes it was
necessary he should be stopped. Suffiaminandus
crat, as Augustus said of Harterius." So also in
his verses on our poet :

Look how the father's face

" Lives in his issue, even so the race

Of Shakspeare's mind and manners brightly shines
*' In his uoell-torned and true-filed lines."

And conformable to all these ancient testimonies is
that of Mr. Rowe, who informs us, from the tradi-
tional accounts received from his native town, that
our poet's " pleasurable wit and good-nature engaged
him in the acquaintance and entitled him to the
friendship of the gentlemen of his neighbourhood at
Stratford."

A man, whose manners were thus engaging, whose
wit was thus ready, and whose mind was stored with
such a plenitude of ideas and such a copious assem-
blage of images as his writings exhibit, could not but
have been what he is represented by Mr. Aubrey, a
delightful companion.

But none of those sallies which probably set the table
in a roar have come down to us, and scarcely any thing
is recorded of him, either grave or gay, except one anec-
dote ; the truth of which, to say the least of it, is
very questionable. " Among the gentlemen with whom
he associated," Mr. Rowe informs us, " there is a story
almost still remembered in that country, that he had
a particular intimacy with Mr. Combe, an old gen-
tleman noted thereabouts for his wealth and usury ;

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 495

it happened that in a pleasant conversation amongst
their common friends, Mr. Combe told Shakspeare, in
a laughing manner, that he fancied he intended to
write his epitaph if he happened to outlive him ;
and since he could not know what might be said of
him when he was dead, he desired it might be done
immediately; upon which Shakspeare gave him
these four verses :

" * Ten in the hundred lies here ingrav'd ^ ;

" ' 'Tis a hundred to ten his soul is not sav'd :

" ' If any man ask. Who lies in the tomb ?

*' ' Oh ! ho ! quoth the devil, 'tis my John-a-Combe ^'

* Ten in the hundred lies here ingrav'd ;] In *' The More
the Merrier, containing three-score and odd heedless epigrams,
shot (like the fooles bolts), among you, light where they will : "
By H. P. Gent. &c. 1608. I find the following couplet, which is
almost the same as the two beginning lines of this Epitaph on
John-a-Combe :

Feneratoris Epitaphium.
" Ten in the hundred lies under this stone,
** And a hundred to ten to the devil he's gone."

Steevens.

So, in Camden's Remains, 1614:
'* Here lyes ten in the hundred,
" In the ground fast ramm'd ;
'Tis an hundred to ten
*' But his soule is damn'd." Malone.

* Oh ! oh ! quoth the devil, 'tis my John-a-Combe.] The
Rev. Francis Peck, in his Memoirs of the Life and Poetical
Works of Mr. John Milton, 4to. 1740, p. 223, has introduced
another epitaph imputed (on what authority is unknown) to Shak-
speare. It is on Tom-a-Combe, alias Thin-beard, brother to this
John, who is mentioned by Mr. Rowe :

Thin in beard, and thick in purse ;
" Never man beloved worse ;
" He went to the grave with many a curse :
" The devil and he had both one nurse." Steevens.

496

THE LIFE OF

" But the sharpness of the satire is said to have
stung the man so severely, that he never forgave it."
Many years ago Mr. Steevens expressed an opinion
that this story was altogether unfounded '\ In

I suspect these lines were sent to Mr. Peck by some person
that meant to impose upon him. It appears from Mr. John
Combe's will, that his brother Thomas was dead in 1614-. John
devised the greater part of his real and personal estate to his
nephew Thomas Combe, with whom Shakspeare was certainly on
good terms, having bequeathed him his sword.

Since I wrote the above, I find from the register of Stratford,
that Mr. Thomas Combe (the brother of John) was buried there,
Jan. 22, 1608-9. Malone.

3 I take this opportunity to avow my disbelief that Shakspeare
was the author of Mr. Combe's epitaph, or that it was written by
any other person at the request of that gentleman. If Betterton
the player did really visit Warwickshire for the sake of collecting
anecdotes relative to our author, perhaps be was too easily satis-
fied with such as fell in his way, without making any rigid
search into their authenticity. It appears also from a following
copy of this inscription, that it was not ascribed to Shakspeare so
early as two years after his death. Mr. Reed of Staple- Inn
obligingly pointed it out to me in the Remains^ &c. of Richard
Brathwaite, 1618; and as his edition of our epitaph varies in
some measure from the latter one published by Mr. Rowe, I shall
not hesitate to transcribe it :

*' Upon one John Combe of Stratford upon Avon, a notable
Usurer, fastened upon a Tombe that he had caused to be
built in his Life-Time.

" Ten in the hundred must lie in his grave,
** But a hundred to ten whether God will him have ;
" Who then must be interr'd in this tombe?
** Oh (quoth the divill) my John a Combe."
Here it may be observed that, strictly speaking, this is no
jocular epitaph, but a malevolent prediction ; and Brathwaite's
copy is surely more to be depended on (being procured in or
before the year 1618) than that delivered to Betterton or Rowe,

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

497

Aubrey's anecdotes so often quoted, the story is told
in a different manner.

almost a century afterwards. It has been already remarked, that
two of the lines said to have been produced on this occasion, were
printed as an epigram in 1608, by H. P. Gent, and are likewise
found in Camden's Remains, 1614. I may add, that a usurer's
solicitude to know what would be reported of him when he was
dead, is not a very probable circumstance ; neither was Shak-
speare of a disposition to compose an invective, at once so bitter
and uncharitable, during a 'pleasant conversation among the com-
mon friends of himself and a gentleman, with whose family he
lived in such friendship, that at his death he bequeathed his
sword to Mr. Thomas Combe as a legacy. A miser's monument
indeed, constructed during his life-time, m.ight be regarded as a
challenge to satire ; and we cannot wonder that anonymous lam-
poons should have been affixed to the marble designed to convey
the character of such a being to posterity. — I hope I may be
excused for this attempt to vindicate Shakspeare from the imputa-
tion of having poisoned the hour of confidence and festivity, by
producing the severest of all censures on one of his company. I
am unwilling, in short, to think he could so wantonly and so
publickly have expressed his doubts concerning the salvation of
one of his fellow-creatures. Steevens.

Since the above observations first appeared (in a note to the
edition of our author's Poems which I published in 1780), I have
obtained an additional proof of what has been advanced, in vin-
dication of Shakspeare on this subject. It occurred to me that
the will of John Combe might possibly throw some light on this
matter, and an examination of it some years ago furnished me
with such evidence as renders the story recorded in Brathwaite's
Remains very doubtful ; and still more strongly proves that, who-
ever was the author of this epitaph, it is highly improbable that
it should have been written by Shakspeare.

The very first direction given by Mr. Combe in his will is, con-
cerning a tomb to be erected to him after his death. '* My will
is, that a convenient tomb of the value of threescore pounds shall
by my executors hereafter named, out of my goods and chattels
first raysed, within one year after my decease, be set over mc."

VOL. II. 2! K

498

THE LIFE OF

" Ben Jonson and he did gather humours of men

So much for Brathwaite's account of his having erected his own
tomb in his life-time. That he had any quarrel with our author,
or that Shakspeare liad by any act stung him so severely that Mr.
Combe never forgave him, appears equally void of foundation ; for
by his will he bequeaths " to Mr. William Shakspere Five
Pounds." It is probable that they lived in intimacy, and that
Mr. Combe had made some purchase from our poet; for he
devises to his brother George, *' the close or grounds known by
the name of Parson's Close, alias, Shakspere's Close.'* It must
be owned that Mr. Combe's will is dated Jan. 28, 1612-13, about
eighteen months before his death; and therefore the evidence
now produced is not absolutely decisive, as he might have
erected a tomb, and a rupture might have happened between
him and Shakspeare, after the making of this will : but it is very
improbable that any such rupture should have taken place ; for
if the supposed cause of offence had happened subsequently to
the execution of the instrument, it is to be presumed that he
would have revoked the legacy to Shakspeare : and the same
argument may be urged with respect to the direction concerning
his tomb.

Mr. Combe by his will bequeathed to Mr. Francis Collins the
elder, of the borough of Warwick (who appears as a legatee and
subscribing witness to Shakspeare's will, and therefore may be
presumed a common friend), ten pounds ; to his godson John
Collins (the son of Francis), ten pounds ; to Mrs. Susanna
Collins (probably godmother to our poet's eldest daughter), six
pounds, thirteen shillings, and four-pence ; to Mr. Henry Walker
(father to Shakspeare's godson), twenty shillings ; to the poor of
Stratford, twenty pounds ; and to his servants, in various legacies,
one hundred and ten pounds. He was buried at Stratford, July 12,
1614, and his will was proved, Nov. 10, 1615.

Our author, at the time of making his will, had it not in his
power to show any testimony of his regard for Mr. Combe, that
gentleman being then dead ; but that he continued a friendly
correspondence with his family to the last, appears evidently
(as Mr. Steevens has observed) from his leaving his sword to
Mr. Thomas Combe, the nephew, residuary legatee, and one of the
executors of John.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 499

wherever they came. One time as he was at the

On the whole we may conclude, that the lines preserved by
Rowe, and inserted with some variation in Brathwaite's Remains,
which the latter has mentioned to have been affixed to Mr.
Combe's tomb in his life-time, were not written till after Shak*
speare's death ; for the executors, who did not prove the will till
Nov. 1615, could not well have erected " a fair monument" of
considerable expence for those times, till the middle or perhaps
the end of the year 1616, in the April of which year our poet
died. Between that time and the year 1618, when Brath-
waite's book appeared, some one of those persons (we may pre-
sume) who had suffered by Mr. Combe's severity, gave vent to his
feelings in the satirical composition preserved by Rowe ; part of
which, we have seen, was borrowed from epitaphs that had
already been printed. — That Mr. Combe was a money-lender,
may be inferred from a clause in his will, in which he mentions
his *' good and just debtors; " to every one of whom he remits
*' twenty shillings for every twenty pounds, and so after this rate
for a greater or lesser debt," on their paying in to his executors
what they owe,

Mr. Combe married Mrs. Rose Clopton, the youngest daughter
of William Clopton, of Clopton, Esq. [it was old John who
married Rose Clopton], August 27, 1561 ; and therefore was
probably, wlien he died, eighty years old. His property, from
the description of it, appears to have been considerable.

In justice to this gentleman it should be remembered, that in
the language of Shakspeare's age an usurer did not mean one
who took exorbitant, but any, interest or usance for money ;
which many then considered as criminal. The opprobrious term
by which such a person was distinguished, " Ten in the hun-
dred," proves this ; for ten per cent, was the ordinary interest of
money. See Shakspeare's will. — Sir Philip Sidney directs by his
will, made in 1586, that Sir Francis Walsingham shall put four
thousand pounds which the testator bequeathed to his daughter,
** to the best behoofe either by purchase of land or lease, or some
other good and godly use, but in no case to let it out for any
usury at all." Malone.

In wliatever form it may have been transmitted to us, I cannot
2! K 2

500

THE LIFE OF

taverne at Stratford, Mr. Combes \ an old usurer, was

allow myself to entertain a doubt that this legendary story was
an idle traditionary fabrication from beginning to end. Mr.
Rowe's expressions are worthy of notice ; he tells us it is al-
most still remembered at Stratford, — a very slender foundation
to rest upon. These verses occur in a variety of different shapes
in our old miscellanies, and some of the variations are pointed out
in a preceding page, I could easily add to the number if it were
worth while, but it is to be remarked, that in none of them are
the lines attributed to Shakspeare. His property in them rests
entirely upon the authority of Aubrey, and Rowe's tradition. This
epitaph occurs, as Mr. Steevens has already observed, in Brath-
waite's Remains, and I have myself very little doubt that Brath-
waite was the author, and that the circumstance of building his tomb
in his life-time was a mere fiction, to add poignancy to the satire.
My friend, Mr. Haslewood, in his very curious republication of
Barnabas Itinerarium, has given us an ample account of this vo-
luminous writer's productions ; of these, there is one entitled
Spiritual Spicerie, containing sundry sweet Tractates of Devotion
and Pietie. In one of these tractates, the author penitentially
reviews the errors of his past life, and probably alludes to this
very lampoon : ** / could jeere him to his face 'whom I needed
most ; Ten at hmidred I meane, and he would not stick to pay
mee in mine own coyne; I might beg a courtesie at his hands,
but to starve for't never prevaile, wherein I found this instru-
ment of usurie and the Devil to be of one societie," &c. As we
find from this that he was in the habit of jeering a money-
lender, and as these lines are printed in his name, it is, I think,
much more probable, that they proceeded from an angry spend-
thrift, than that Shakspeare should have composed them under
any circumstances, upon one with whom he lived in habits of
friendship. Another legendary story which does perhaps still less
honour to our poet, I will give in the words of a native of Strat-
ford, John Jordan, as he communicated it to Mr. Malone :

"Amongst the many juvenile levities of Shakspeare, I cannot
omit delineating some other traits of his character; tradition
says that he loved hearty draughts of English beer or ale, and
that there were then two companies of people who usually met at

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

501

to be buried ^ ; he makes then this extemporary
epitaph upon him :

a village called Bidford, about seven miles below Stratford, upon
the Banks of the Avon, who distinguished themselves by the
appellations of the topers and sippers, the former of whom were
accounted the most eminent in the science of drinking the largest
quantity of liquor without being intoxicated ; yet the latter were
also very powerful, and looked on themselves superior to most
other companies of drinkers in this country.

*' These sons of Bacchus challenged all the men in England to
drink with them, to try the strength of their heads ; the Stratford
bard and his companions accepted it, and repaired to Bidford on a
Whitsun Monday, to make a trial with the topers, but to their
disappointment, they discovered that they were gone to Evesham
Fair upon a like excursion ; so the Stratfordians with Shakspeare
were obliged to take up with the sippers, who they scoffed at as
unworthy the contest ; but upon trial they found themselves very
inferior to their opponents, and were at last obliged to own their
superiority ; for the poet and his companions got so intoxicated,
that they were obliged to decline any further trial ; and leaving
Bidford, they proceeded homeward ; but poor William when he
came about half a mile from the village, unable to go on, laid
himself down upon the verdant turf, beneath the umbrageous
boughs of a wide spreading crab tree, where he took his night's
repose, the lark's early matins awaked him, and he was invited
to return to Bidford by some of his convivial companions to renew
the contest, but he refused ; says he, I have drank with
** * Piping Pebworth, Dancing Marston,
" ' Haunted Hillborough, and Hungry Grafton,

' With Dadging Exhall, Papist Wixford,
*' * Beggarly Broom, and Drunken Bidford." '
** These lines seem to intimate that the opponents consisted of
a motley group selected from the above villages ; Pebworth is
still celebrated for the skill of its inhabitants, in music and rural
festivity ; and Long Marston or Marston Sicca (as it is commonly
wrote), the inhabitants of which are noted for their activity in
country dances ; and Hillborough is a lonely hamlet said by

502

THE LIFE OF

** Ten in the hundred the devil allowes,
" But Combes will have twelve, he swears and he vowes:

If any one aske, who lies in this tomb,
•* Hoh ! quoth the devill, 'tis my John o'Combe."

In a former page I have proved, if I mistake not,
from an examination of Mr. Combe's will, and other

the tradition of the vicinage to have been haunted by spirits and
fairies ; Hungry Grafton, I suppose, received that appellation from
the barrenness of its soil ; but however that may be, the produce
of its excellent stone quarries make sufficient amends for the
sterility of the land. Dadging Exhall, — I must confess I am at a
loss how to account for the appellation of Dadging ; but Papist
Wixford, is a village belonging to the Throckmorton family, and
the tenants are most of them of the Roman Catholick Religion.
Beggarly Broom must have been so called from the badness of
the soil ; and Drunken Bidford still deserves the name ; for though
it is but a small village, there are five public houses in it, and
the people love ale as well as they did in the days of Shakspeare.
Of this I am certain, from my own observations, having resided
amongst them above half a year."

I cannot help thinking that this is a second instance in which
poor Brathwaite may have been robbed of his property. This
doggerel nonsense is very unlikely to have proceeded from Shak-
speare, but would cut a very respectable figure in Drunken Bar-
tiabie's Journal. It may at first create surprise that such anec-
dotes should have been at any time current in Stratford of one
who is their greatest boast ; but this mode of doing honour to a
distinguished character may be paralleled elsewhere. Those
pranks which, under difl'erent names, such as Marcolphus and Ber-
toldo, &c. have aftbrded amusement to the lower orders in almost
every nation, are attributed in a popular Scotch chap-book to
Buchanan. Many of his countrymen, who never heard of him
as an historian, or a poet, are familiarly acquainted with George
Buchanan, the king's jester. Bo swell.

4 This custom of adding an S to many names, both in speaking
and writing, was very common in the last age. Shakspeare's fel-

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

503

circumstances, that no credit is due to Mr. Rowe's
account of our poet's having so incensed him by an
epitaph which he made on him in his presence, at a
tavern at Stratford, that the old gentleman never
forgave him. And Mr. Aubrey's account of this
matter,, which I had not then seen, fully confirms
what I suggested on the subject : for here we find,
that the epitaph was made after Combe's death.
Nor is this sprightly effusion inconsistent with Shak-
speare's having lived in a certain degree of familiarity
with that gentleman ; whom he might have respected
for some qualities, though he indulged himself in a
sudden and playful censure of his inordinate attention
to the acquirement of wealth, at a time when that
ridicule could not affect him who was the object of it.

Mr. Steevens has justly observed, that the verses
exhibited by Mr. Rowe, contain not a jocular epi-
taph but a malevolent prediction ; and every reader
will, I am sure, readily agree with him, that it is
extremely inprobable that Shakspeare should have
poisoned the hour of confidence and friendship by pro-
ducing one of the severest censures on one of his
company, and so wantonly and publickly express his

low comedian, John Heminge, was always called Mr. Hemings
by his contemporaries, and Lord Clarendon constantly writes
Bishop Earles, instead of Bishop Earle.

" S (says Camden in his Remaines, ^to. 1605,) also is joyned
to most [names] now, as Manors, Knoles, Crofts, Hilles,
Combes^'' &c.

5 Mr. Combe was buried at Stratford, July 12, 1614. The
entry in the Register of that parish confirms the observation made
above; for though written by a clergyman, it stands thus:
*' July 12, 1614. Mr. John Combes, Gener."

604

THE LIFE OF

doubts concerning the salvation of one of his fellow
creatures. The foregoing more accurate statement
entirely vindicates our poet from this imputation.

These extemporary verses having, I suppose, not
been set down in writing by their author, and being
inaccurately transmitted to London, appear in an
entirely different shape in Braithwaite's Remaines,
and there we find them affixed to a tomb erected byr
Mr. Combe in his life-time. I have already shown
that no such tomb was erected by Mr. Combe, and
therefore Braithwaite's story is as little to be credited
as Mr. Rowe's. That such various representations
should be made of verses of which the author pro-
bably never gave a written copy, and perhaps never
thought of after hehad uttered them, is not at all
extraordinary. Who has not, in his own experience,
met with similar variations in the accounts of a
transaction which passed but a few months before he
had occasion to examine minutely and accurately
into the real state of the fact ?

In further support of Mr. Aubrey's exhibition of
these verses, it may be observed, that in his copy the
first couplet is original ; in Mr. Rowe's exhibition of
them it is borrowed from preceding epitaphs. In the
fourth line, Ho (not Oh ho, as Mr. Rowe has it,)
was in Shakspeare's age the appropriate exclamation
of Robin Goodfellow, alias Pucke, alias Hobgoblin ^.

It has been already mentioned p. 118, that Shak-
speare's wife brought him three children: Susanna,

6 See Percy's Reliques of Ancient Poetry, vol. iii. p. 202.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. 505

who was born in May, 1583; and that about eighteen
months afterwards, she was delivered of twins, a son
and a daughter, who were baptized on February 2,
1584-5, by the names of Hamnet and Judith. In
the year 1596, he had the irreparable misfortune
to lose his only son, who died at the early age of
twelve. Susanna, the eldest daughter, was married
June 5, 1607> to Dr. John Hall, a respectable phy-
sician ; the youngest to Mr. Thomas Quiney, Fe-
bruary 10, 1615-16. A more particular account of
our poet's family, will be found in the Stratford Re-
gisters, which are given in the Appendix. We have
now the melancholy task of recording the close of
Shakspeare's virtuous and brilliant career. He died
on his birth-day, April 23, 1616, and had exactly
completed his fifty-second year. From Du Gauge's
Perpetual Almanack, Gloss, in v. Amms (making
allowance for the different style which then prevailed
in England from that on which Du Gauge's calcula-
tion was formed), it appears that the 23d of April in
that year was a Tuesday. There is an interesting
coincidence between the death of our great poet on
his birthday, and that of one almost equally illus-
trious in a sister art. RafFaelle also died on his
birth-day, at the still earlier age of thirty-seven. It
was not only in this circumstance that they bore a
resemblance to each other ; but as we learn from
Vasari's character of that great painter, in mildness
of manners and benevolence of disposition.

No account has been transmitted to us of the
malady which at so early a period of life deprived
England of its brightest ornament. The private

506

THE LIFE OF

note-book of his son-in-law Dr. Hall \ containing a
short state of the cases of his patients, was a few
years ago put into my hands by my friend, the late
Dr. Wright ; aild as Dr. Hall married our poet's
daughter in the .year 1607, and undoubtedly at-
tended Shakspeare in his last illness, being then forty
years old, I had hopes this book might have enabled
me to gratify the publick curiosity on this subject.
But unluckily the earliest case recorded by Hall, is
dated in 1617. He had probably filled some other
book with memorandums of his practice in preceding
years ; which by some contingency may hereafter be
found, and inform posterity of the particular circum-
stances that attended the death of our great poet.
Shakspeare was buried April 25, 1616, on the north
side of the chancel of the great church at Stratford.
On his grave-stone underneath is the following in-
scription, expressed, as Mr. Steevens observes, in an
uncouth mixture of small and capital letters :

" Good Frend for lesus SAKE forbeare

" To diGG T-E Dust EncloAsed HERe

** Blese be T-E Man y spares T-Es Stones

" And curst be He y moves my Bones s." Steevens.

7 Dr. Hall's pocket-book after his death fell into the hands of
a surgeon of Warwick, who published a translation of it, (with
some additions of his own) under the title of Select Observations
on the English Bodies of eminent Persons, in desperate Diseases,
&c. The third edition was printed in 1683.

^ And curst be he that moves my bones.] It is uncertain whe-
ther this epitaph was written by Shakspeare himself, or by one of
his friends after his death. The imprecation contained in this last
line, was perhaps suggested by an apprehension that our author's

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

507

A monument was afterwards erected to his me-
mory, at what time is not known, but certainly

remains might share the same fate with those of the rest of his
countrymen, and be added to the immense pile of human bones
deposited in the charnel house at Stratford. This, however, is
mere conjecture ; for similar execrations are found in many
ancient Latin epitaphs.

Mr. Steevens has justly mentioned it as a singular circumstance,
that Shakspeare does not appear to have written any verses on his
contemporaries, either in praise of the living, or in honour of the
dead. I once imagined that he had mentioned Spenser with
kindness in one of his Sonnets ; but have since discovered that
the Sonnet to which I allude, was written by Richard Barnefield.
If, however, the following epitaphs be genuine, (and indeed the
latter is much in Shakspeare's manner), he in two instances
overcame that modest diffidence, which seems to have supposed
the eulogium of his humble muse of no value.

In a Manuscript volume of poems by William Herrick and others,
in the hand-writing of the time of Charles I. which is among
Rawlinson's Collections in the Bodleian Library, is the following
epitaph, ascribed to our poet :

" AN EPITAPH.

" When God was pleas'd, the world unwilling yet,

" Elias James to nature payd his debt,

** And here reposeth : as he liv'd, he dyde ;

** The saying in him strongly verefide, —

** Such life, such death : then, the known truth to tell,

*• He liv*d a godly life, and dyde as well.

" WM. SHAKSPEARE."

There was formerly a family of the surname of James at Strat-
ford. Anne, the wife of Richard James, was buried there on the
same day with our poet's widow ; and Margaret, the daughter of
John James, died there in April, 1616.

A monumental inscription *' of a better leer," and said to be
written by our author, is preserved in a collection of Epitaphs,
at the end of the Visitation of Salop, taken by Sir William Dug-

508

THE LIFE OF

before 1623, as it is mentioned in the commendatory
verses of Leonard Digges. He is represented under
an arch, in a sitting posture, a cushion spread before
him, with a pen in his right hand, and his left rested
on a scroll of paper. The following Latin distich is
engraved under the cushion :

Judicio Pylium, genio Socratem, arte Maronem,
Terra tegit, populus mseret, Olympus habet.

In addition to this Latin inscription, the following
lines are found on a tablet immediately underneath
the cushion on his monument :

dale in the year 1664, now remaining in the College of Arms
C 35, fol. 20; a transcript of which Sir Isaac Heard, Garter
Principal King at Arms, has obligingly transmitted to me.

Among the monuments in Tongue church, in the county of
Salop, is one erected in remembrance of Sir Thomas Stanley,
Knight, who died, as I imagine, about the year 1600. In the
Visitation -book it is thus described by Sir William Dugdale :

** On the north side of the chancell stands a very statelie tombe,
supported with Corinthian columnes. It hath two figures of
men in armour, thereon lying, the one below the arches and
columnes, and the other above them, and this epitaph upon it.

*' Thomas Stanley, Knight, second son of Edward Earle of
Derby, Lord Stanley and Strange, descended from the famielie of
the Stanleys, married Margaret Vernon, one of the daughters
and co-heires of Sir George Vernon of Nether-Haddon, in the
county of Derby, Knight, by whom he had issue two sons,
Henry and Edward. Henry died an infant ; Edward survived, to
whom those lordships descended : and married the lady Lucie
Percie, second daughter of the Earle of Northumberland : by
her he had issue seaven daughters. She and her foure daughters,
Arabella, Marie, Alice, and Priscilla, are interred under a mo-
nument in the church of Waltham in the county of Essex.
Thomas, her son, died in his infancy, and is buried in the parish

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

509

*• Stay, passenger, why dost thou go so fast,
*' Read, if thou canst, whom envious death hath plac'd
** Within this monument ; Shakspeare, with whom
" Quick nature dy'd ; whose name doth deck the tomb
** Far more than cost ; since all that he hath writ
*' Leaves living art but page to serve his wit.

" Obiit Ano. Dni. 1619, aet. 53, die 23 Apri."

Mr. Granger observes, (Biog. Hist. voL i. p. 259,)
that " it has been said there never was an original
portrait of Shakspeare, but that Sir Thomas Clarges
after his death caused a portrait to be drawn for him
from a person who nearly resembled him." This
entertaining writer was a great collector of anec-

church of Winwich in the county of Lancaster. The other three,
Petronilla, Frances, and Venesia, are yet living.

"These following verses were made by William Shakespeare,
the late famous tragedian :

Written upojj the east end of this tombe.

Aske who lyes here, but do not weepe ;
'* He is not dead, he doth but sleepe.
*' This stony register is for his bones.

His fame is more perpetual than these stones :
" And his own goodness, with himself being gone,
" Shall live, when earthly monument is none."

** Written upon the west end thereof.
** Not monumental stone preserves our fame,

Nor skye- aspiring pyramids our name.
'* The memory of him for whom this stands,
*' Shall out-live marble, and defacers' hands.
" When all to time's consumption shall be given,
"Stanley, for whom this stands, shall stand in heaven."
The last line of this epitaph, though the worst, bears very
strong marks of the hand of Shakspeare, The beginning of the
first line, " Aske who lyes here," reminds us of that which we

510

THE LIFE OF

dotes, but not always very scrupulous in enquiring
into the authenticity of the information which he
procured; for this improbable tale, I find on ex-
amination, stands only on the insertion of an anony-
mous writer in The Gentleman's Magazine, for
August, 1750, who boldly "affirmed it as an absolute
fact ; " but being afterwards publickly called upon
to produce his authority, by the Rev. Mr. Green,
Rector of Welford, near Stratford, never produced
any. There is the strongest reason therefore to
presume it a forgery.

" Mr. Walpole (adds Mr. Granger) informs me,
that the only original picture of Shakspeare is that
which belonged to Mr. Keck, from whom it passed
to Mr. NicoU, whose only daughter married the
Marquis of Caernarvon" [now Duke of Ghandos.]

have been just examining : " If any man ask who lies in this
tomb," &c. — And in the fifth line we find a thought which our
poet has also introduced in King Henry VIII. :

" Ever belov'd and loving may his rule be !
*' And, when old time shall lead him to his grave,
" Goodness and he Jill up one monument ! "
This epitaph must have been written after the year 1600, for
Venetia Stanley, who afterwards was the wife of Sir Kenelm
Digby, was born in that year. With a view to ascertain its date
more precisely, the churches of Great and Little Waltham
have been examined for the monument said to have been erected
to Lady Lucy Stanley and her four daughters, but in vain ; for
no trace of it remains : nor could the time of their respective
deaths be ascertained, the registers of those parishes being lost.—
Sir William Dugdale was born in Warwickshire, was bred at the
free-school of Coventry, and in the year 1625, purchased the
manor of Blythe in that county, where he then settled and after-
wards spent a great part of his life : so that his testimony respect-
ing this epitaph is sufficient to ascertain its authenticity.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

511

From this picture, his Grace, at my request, very
obligingly permitted a drawing to be made by that
excellent artist Mr. Ozias Humphry ; and from that
drawing the print prefixed to the present edition has
been engraved.

In the manuscript notes of the late Mr. Oldys, this
portrait is said to have been " painted by old Cor-
nelius Jansen." " Others," he adds, " say, that it
was done by Richard Burbage, the player ; " and in
another place he ascribes it to " John Taylor, the
player." This Taylor, it is said in The Critical
Review for 1770, left it by xvill to Sir William
D'Avenant. But unluckily there was no player of
the christian and surname of John Taylor contem-
porary with Shakspeare. The player who performed
in Shakspeare's company was Joseph Taylor. There
was, however, a painter of the name of John Taylor,
to whom in his early youth it is barely possible that
we may have been indebted for the only original por-
trait of our author; for in the Picture-Gallery at
Oxford are two portraits of Taylor the Water-
Poet, and on each of them, John Taylor pinx.
1655." There appears some resemblance of man-
ner between these portraits and the picture of
Shakspeare in the Duke of Chandos's collection.
That picture (I express the opinion of Sir Joshua
Reynolds) has not the least air of Cornelius Jansen's
performances.

That this picture was once in the possession of Sir
William D'Avenant, can admit of little doubt ; but
it is much more likely to have been purchased by
him from some of the players after the theatres were
shut up by authority, and the veterans of the stage

512

THE LIFE OF

were reduced to great distress, than to have been
bequeathed to him by the person who painted it ; in
whose custody it is improbable that it should have
remained. Sir William D'Avenant appears to have
died insolvent. There is no Will of his in the Pre-
rogative-Office ; but administration of his effects was
granted to John Otway, his principal creditor, in
May 1668. After his death, Betterton the actor
bought it, probably at a publick sale of his effects.
While it was in Betterton's possession, it was en-
graved by Vandergucht, for Mr. Rowe's edition of
Shakspeare, in 1709- Betterton made no will, and
died very indigent. He had a large collection of
portraits of actors in crayons, which were bought at
the sale of his goods, by Bullfinch the Printseller, who
sold them to one Mr. Sykes. The portrait of Shak-
speare was purchased by Mrs. Barry the actress, who
sold it afterwards for forty guineas to Mr. Robert
Keck. In 1719? while it was in Mr. Keek's pos-
session, an engraving was made from it by Vertue: a
large half-sheet. Mr. Nicoll of Colney-Hatch, Mid-
dlesex, marrying the heiress of the Keck family, this
picture devolved to him ; and while in his possession,
it was, in 1747, engraved by Houbraken for Birch's
Illustrious Heads. By the marriage of the Duke of
Chandos with the daughter of Mr. Nicoll, it became
his Grace's property ; and by the marriage of the
present Marquis of Buckingham with his Grace's
daughter. Lady Anne Elizabeth Brydges, it now
adorns the Marquis's collection at Stowe.

Sir Godfrey Kneller painted a picture of our
author, which he presented to Dryden, but from what
picture he copied, I am unable to ascertain, as I have

WILLIAM SIIAKSPEARE.

513

never seen Kneller's picture. The poet repaid him
by an elegant copy of Verses. — See his Poems, vol. ii.
p. 231, edit. 1743:

Shakspeare, thy gift, I place before my sight,

** With awe I ask his blessing as I write ;

*' With reverence look on his majestick face,

** Proud to be less, but of his godlike race.

*' His soul inspires me, while thy praise I write,

*' And I like Teucer under Ajax fight :

" Bids thee, through me, be bold ; with dauntless breast

" Contemn the bad, and emulate the best:
Like his, thy criticks in the attempt are lost,
When most they rail, know then, they envy most."

It appears from a circumstance mentioned by
Dryden, that these verses were written after the year
1683: probably after Rymer's book had appeared in
1693. Dryden having made no will, and his wife
Lady Elizabeth renouncing, administration was
granted on the 10th of June, 1700, to his son
Charles, who was drowned in the Thames near
Windsor in 1704. His younger brother, Erasmus,
succeeded to the title of Baronet, and died without
issue in 1711. This picture is now in the possession
of Earl Fitzwilliam.

About the year 1725 a mezzotinto of Shakspeare
was scraped by Simon, said to be done from an
original picture painted by Zoust or Soest, then in
the possession of T. Wright, painter, in Coven t
Garden. The earliest known picture painted by Zoust
in England, was done in 1657; so that if he ever
painted a picture of Shakspeare, it must have been a
copy. It could not, however, have been made from
D'Avenant's picture (unless the painter took very

VOL. II. 2 L

514

THE LIFE OF

great liberties), for the whole air, dress, disposition of
the hair, &c. are different. I have seen a pic-
ture in the possession of Douglas, Esq. at Ted-

dington near Twickenham, which is, I believe, the
very picture from which Simon's mezzotinto was
made. It is on canvas (about 24 inches by 20), and
somewhat smaller than the life.

The earliest print of our poet that appeared, is
that in the title-page of the first folio edition of his
works, 1623, engraved by Martin Droeshout. On
this print the following lines, addressed to the reader,
were written by Ben Jonson :

" This figure that thou here seest put.

It was for gentle Shakspeare cut ;
" Wherein the graver had a strife
" With nature, to out-do the life.
" O, could he but have drawn his wit
*' As well in brass, as he hath hit
" His face, the print would then surpass
" All that was ever writ in brass ;
" But since he cannot, reader, look
*' Not on his picture, but his book."

Droeshout engraved also the heads of John Fox
the martyrologist, Montjoy Blount, son of Charles
Blount Earl of Devonshire, William Fairfax, who
fell at the siege of Frankendale in 1621, and John
Howson, Bishop of Durham. The portrait of Bishop
Howson is at Christ Church, Oxford. By comparing
any of these prints (the tw^o latter of which are well
executed) with the original pictures from whence the
engravings were made, a better judgment might be
formed of the fidelity of our author's portrait, as ex-

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

515

hibited by this engraver, than from Jonson's asser-
tion, that " in this figure

'* the graver had a strife

*' With nature, to out-do the life ; *'

a compliment which in the books of that age was paid
to so many engravers that nothing decisive can be
inferred from it. — It does not appear from what pic-
ture this engraving was made; but from the dress, and
the singular disposition of the hair, &c. it undoubtedly
was engraved from a picture, and probably a very
ordinary one. There is no other way of accounting
for the great difference between this print of
Droeshout's, and his spirited portraits of Fairfax and
Bishop Howson, but by supposing that the picture of
Shakspeare from which he copied was a very coarse
performance.

The next print in point of time is, according to
Mr. Walpole and Mr. Granger, that executed by J.
Payne, a scholar of Simon Pass, in 1634; with a
laurel-branch in the poet's left-hand. A print of
Shakspeare by so excellent an engraver as Payne,
would probably exhibit a more perfect representation
of him than any other of those times; but I much
doubt whether any such ever existed. Mr. Granger,
I apprehend, has erroneously attributed to Payne the
head done by Marshall in 1640 (apparently from
Droeshout's larger print), which is prefixed to a
spurious edition of Shakspeare's Poems published in
that year. In Marshall's print the poet has a laurel
branch in his left hand. Neither Mr. Walpole, nor
any of the other great collectors of prints, were pos-

^ I. 2

51G

THE LIFE OF

sessed of, or ever saw, any print of Sliakspeare by
Payne, as far as I can learn.

Two other prints only remain to be mentioned;
one engraved by Vertue in 1721, for Mr. Pope's
edition of ovir author's plays in quarto ; said to be
engraved from an original picture in the possession
of the Earl of Oxford ^ ; and another, a mezzotinto,
by Earlom, prefixed to an edition of King Lear, in
1770 ; said to be done from an original by Cornelius
Jansen, in the collection of Charles Jennens, Esq.

Most of the other prints of Shakspeare that have
appeared, were copied from some or other of those
which I have mentioned.

By his will, which appears to have been originally
drawn up about two months before his death, Shak-
speare left the bulk of his property to his eldest
daughter, Susanna Hall. It is given at length in the
Appendix, where whatever observations to which its
provisions may give rise, will be found appended in
the notes : one topick, however, it may be fit to ad-
vert to here. It commences with a pious declaration
of his religious principles, but affords not the slightest
countenance to a notion which has been started, of
Shakspeare being a Roman Catholick. To this sup-
position, I myself may have given some support by

» *' The portrait palmed upon Mr. Pope," (I use the words of
the late Mr. Oldys, in a MS. note to his copy of Langbaine,)
** for an original of Shakspeare, from which he had his fine
plate engraven, is evidently a juvenile portrait of King James I."
I am no judge in these matters, but only deliver an opinion,
which if ill-grounded maybe easily overthrown. The portrait, to
me at least, has no traits of Shakspeare. Steevens.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

517

the publication some years ago, of a singular manu-
script, purporting to be the confession of faith of John
Shakspeare, whom I conjectured to have been either
the father or brother of the poet ; but I am now con-
vinced that I was altogether mistaken. I have
already, I trust, satisfactorily proved, p. 53, that he
had no brother of the name of John, and I have as
little doubt that the person by whom this paper was
drawn up, was not his father ^. That these opinions
were not entertained by the poet himself, must be
evident at once from a perusal of his works. The
sentiments which we find him expressing in
Henry VIII. and King John, could not have fallen
from one who was friendly to the pretensions of the
Papal See ; and in Romeo and Juliet, we find him
speaking of evening mass, a mistake which could not
have occurred to a Roman Catholick.

Gildon, without authority, I believe, says, that our
author left behind him an estate of 300/. per ann.
This was equal to at least 1000/. per ann. at this
day ; the relative value of money, the mode of living
in that age, the luxury and taxes of the present time,

^ Mr. Malone has already expressed this opinion, in his Detec-
tion of the Ireland forgery ; and has there mentioned, that he
had obtained documents which clearly proved that this confession
of faith could not have been the composition of any one of our
poet's family. I have not been able to discover this documentary
evidence, but I suppose it may have been connected with his
discovery of John Shakspeare the shoemaker, whom he mentions
in the commencement of this Life, and who has been hitherto
confounded with the poet's father. It is highly improbable,
indeed, that the latter, who held the^situation of Bailiff of Strat-
ford, should have been a Roman Catholick. Boswell.

618

THE LIFE OF

and various other circumstances, being considered.
But I doubt whether all his property amounted to
much more than 200/. per ann. which yet was a con-
siderable fortune in those times. He appears from
his grand-daughter's will to have possessed, in Bish-
opton, and Stratford Welcome, four yard land and a
half, ui yard land is a denomination well known in
Warwickshire, and contains from thirty to sixty acres.
The average therefore being forty-five, four yard land
and a half may be estimated at about two hundred
acres. As sixteen years purchase was the common
rate at which the land was sold at that time, that is,
one half less than at this day, we may suppose that
these lands were let at seven shillings per acre, and
produced 70/. per annum. If we rate the New-
Place with the appurtenances, and our poet's other
houses in Stratford, at 60/. a year, and his house, &c.
in the Blackfriars (for which he paid 140/.^ at 20/.
a year), we have a rent-roll of 150/. per annum. Of
his personal property it is not now possible to form
any accurate estimate ; but if we rate it at five hun-
dred pounds, money then bearing an interest of ten
per cent. Shakspeare's total income was 200/. per ann.
To Shakspeare's income from his real and personal
property must be added 200/. per ann. which he pro-
bably derived from the theatre, while he continued
on the stage. In The Merry Wives of Windsor,
which was written soon after the year 1600, three
hundred pounds a year is described as an estate of
such magnitude as to cover all the defects of its pos-
sessor :

3 See Appendix.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

519

" O, what a world of vile ill-favour'd faults

" Look handsome in three hundred pounds a year."

The residence in which Shakspeare spent the

\ latter part of his life, must from that circumstance be
ever regarded with veneration. The following ac-
count of it is given by Mr. Theobald :

" In 1614 the greater part of the town of Strat-

i ford was consumed by fire ; but our Shakspeare's
house, among some others, escaped the flames. This

' house was first built by Sir Hugh Clopton, a younger

; brother of an ancient family in that neighbourhood.

I Sir Hugh was SheriflP of London in the reign of
Richard HI. and Lord Mayor in the reign of King
Henry VII. By his will he bequeathed to his elder
brother's son his manor of Clopton, &c. and his house,
by the name of the Great House in Stratford. Good
part of the estate is yet [in 1733] in the possession
of Edward Clopton, Esq. and Sir Hugh Clopton,
Knt. lineally descended from the elder brother of the
first Sir Hugh.

; " The estate had now been sold out of the Clopton
family for above a century, at the time when Shak-
speare became the purchaser: who having repaired
and modelled it to his own mind, changed the name
to New-Place, which the mansion-house, since erected

' upon the same spot, at this day retains. The house,
and lands which attended it, continued in Shak-
speare's descendants to the time of the Restoration ;
when they were re-purchased by the Clopton family,
and the mansion now belongs to Sir Hugh Clopton,
Knt. To the favour of this worthy gentleman I owe
the knowledge of one particular in honour of our

520

THE LIFE OF

poet's once dwelling house, of which I presume Mr.
Rowe never was apprized. When the Civil War
raged in England, and King Charles the First's
Queen was driven by the necessity of her affairs to
make a recess in Warwickshire, she kept her court for
three weeks in New-Place. We may reasonably
suppose it then the best private house in the town ;
and her Majesty preferred it to the College, which
was in the possession of the Combe family, who did
not so strongly favour the King's party."

Mr. Theobald is mistaken in supposing that
Shakspeare changed the name of this estate. I
find from ancient documents that it was called
New Place as early at least as 1565. In other
points he appears to have been in an error. From
his words, the reader may be led to suppose that
Henrietta Maria was obliged to take rtfuge from
the rebels in Stratford-upon-Avon : but that was not
the case. She marched from Newark, June 16,
1643, and entered Stratford-upon-Avon triumphantly,
about the 2 2d of the same month, at the head of
three thousand foot and fifteen hundred horse, with
one hundred and fifty waggons and a train of ar-
tillery. Here she was met by Prince Rupert, accom-
panied by a large body of troops. After sojourning
about three weeks at our poet's house, which was then
possessed by his grand-daughter Mrs. Nash, and her
husband, the Queen went (July 13) to the plain of
Keinton under Edge-hill, to meet the King, and pro-
ceeded from thence with him to Oxford, where, says
a contemporary historian, " her coming (July 15) was
rather to a triumph tlian a war."

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

521

Of the College above-mentioned the following was
the origin, John de Stratford Bishop of Winchester,
in the fifth year of King Edward III. founded a
Chantry consisting of five priests, one of whom was
Warden, in a certain chapel adjoining to the church
of Stratford on the south side ; and afterwards (in the
seventh year of Henry VIII.) Ralph Collingwode in-
stituted four choristers, to be daily assistant in the
celebration of divine service there. This Chantry,
says Dugdale, soon after its foundation, was known
by the name of The College of Stratford-upon-Avon.

In the 26th year of Edward III. " a house of
square stone" was built by Ralph de Stratford,
Bishop of London, for the habitation of the five
priests. This house, or another on the same spot, is
the house of which Mr. Theobald speaks, and still
bears the name of " The College."

After the suppression of religious houses, the site
of the college was granted by Edward VI. to John
Earl of Warwick and his heirs ; who being attainted
in the first year of Queen Mary, it reverted to the
crown.

Sir John Clopton, Knt. (the father of Edward
Clopton, Esq. and Sir Hugh Clopton), who died at
Stratford-upon-Avon, in April, 1719, purchased the
estate of New-place, &c. some time after the year
1685, from Sir Reginald Forster, Bart, who married
Mary the daughter of Edward Nash, Esq. cousin-
german to Thomas Nash, Esq. who married our poet's
grand-daughter, Elizabeth Hall. Edward Nash
bought it, after the death of her second husband, Sir
John Barnard, Knight. By her will, which will bq
3

522

THE LIFE OF

found in a subsequent page, she directed her trustee,
Henry Smith, to sell the New-Place, &c, (after the
death of her husband), and to make the first offer of
it to her cousin, Edward Nash, who purchased it
accordingly. His son, Thomas Nash, whom for the
sake of distinction I shall call the younger, having
died without issue, in August, 1652, Edward Nash, by
his will, made on the l6th of March, 1678-9, devised
the principal part of his property to his daughter
Mary, and her husband Reginald Forster, Esq. after-
wards Sir Reginald Forster ; but in consequence of
the testator's only referring to a deed of settlement
executed three days before, without reciting the sub-
stance of it, no particular mention of New-Place is
made in his will. After Sir John Clopton had
bought it from Sir Reginald Forster, he gave it by
deed to his younger son. Sir Hugh, who pulled down
our poet's house, and built one more elegant on the
same spot.

In May, 1742, when Mr. Garrick, Mr. Macklin,
and Mr. Delane visited Stratford, they were hospi-
tably entertained under Shakspeare's mulberry-tree,
by Sir Hugh Clopton. He was a barrister at law,
was knighted by George the First, and died in the
80th year of his age, in Dec. 1751. His nephew,
Edward Clopton, the son of his elder brother Ed-
ward, lived till June, 1753.

The New Place was sold by Henry Talbot, Esq.
son-in-law and executor of Sir Hugh Clopton, in or
soon after the year 1752, to the Rev. Mr. Gastrell,
a man of large fortune, who resided in it but a few
years, in consequence of a disagreement with the

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

523

inhabitants of Stratford. Every house in that town
that is let or valued at more than 40.y. a year, is
assessed by the overseers, according to its worth and
the ability of the occupier, to pay a monthly rate
toward the maintenance of the poor. As Mr. Gas^
trell resided part of the year at Lichfield, he thought
he was assessed too highly ; but being very properly
compelled by the magistrates of Stratford to pay the
whole of what was levied on him, on the principle
that his house was occupied by his servants in his
absence, he peevishly declared, that that house
should never be assessed again ; and soon afterwards
pulled it down, sold the materials, and left the town.
Wishing, as it should seem, to be " damn'd to ever-
lasting fame," he had some time before cut down
Shakspeare's celebrated mulberry-tree, to save him-
self the trouble of showing it to those whose ad-
miration of our great poet led them to visit the poetick
ground on which it stood.

That Shakspeare planted this tree, is as well
authenticated as any thing of that nature can be.
The Rev. Mr. Davenport informed me, that Mr.
Hugh Taylor (the father of his clerk,) who was then
[1790] eighty-five years old, and an alderman of
Warwick, told him that he lived when a boy at
the next house to New-Place ; that his family had
inhabited the house for almost three hundred years ;
that it was transmitted from father to son during the
last and the present century ; that this tree (of the
fruit of which he had often eaten in his younger days,
some of its branches hanging over his father's gar-

524

THE LIFE OF

den) was planted by Shakspeare ; and that till this
was planted, there was no mulberry-tree in that
neighbourhood. Mr. Taylor adds, that he was fre-
quently when a boy at New-Place, and that this
tradition was preserved in the Clopton family, as well
as in his own.

There were scarce any trees of this species in Eng-
land till the year 1609, when by order of King
James many hundred thousand young mulberry-
trees were imported from France, and sent into the
different counties with a view to the feeding of silk-
worms, and the encouragement of the silk manu-
facture. See Camdeni Annales ah anno 1603 ad
annum 1623, published by Smith, quarto, 1691, p. 7;
and Howes's Abridgment of Stowe's Chronicle, edit.
1618, p. 503, where we have a more particular ac-
count of this transaction than in the larger work.
A very few mulberry-trees had been planted before ;
for we are told, that in the preceding year a gentle-
man of Picardy, Monsieur Forest, " kept greate store
of English silkworms at Greenwich, the which the
king with great pleasure came often to see them
worke ; and of their silke he caused a piece of taffeta
to be made."

Shakspeare was perhaps the only inhabitant of
Stratford, whose business called him annually to
London ; and probably on his return from thence in
the spring of the year 1609, he planted this tree.

As a similar enthusiasm to that which with such
diligence has sought after Virgil's tomb, may lead my
countrymen to visit the spot where our great bard

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

spent several years of his life and died ; every
Englishman will, I am sure, concur with me in
wishing that it may enjoy perpetual verdure and
fertility.

In this retreat our Shakspeare's godlike mind
** With matchless skill survey'd all human kind.
" Here may each sweet that blest Arabia knows,
** Flovoers of nil hue, and voithout thorn the rose,
" To latest time, their balmy odours fling,
" And Nature here display eternal spring ! "

APPENDIX.

CONTENTS TO APPENDIX.

No. 1. John Shakspeare's Bill of Complaint against John
Lambert.

2. John Lambert's Answer to John Shakspeare's Bill of

Complaint.

3. John Shakspeare's Replication.

4. Robert Arden's Will, and Inventory.

5. Grant of Arms to John Shakspeare.

6. Grants to Robert Arden.

7. Genealogical Table of Robert Arden.

8. List of Bailiffs at Stratford.

9. Incorporation of Stratford.

10. Inventory of Property belonging to the Borough of Strat-

ford.

11. Particulars relating to the Wool-Trade at Stratford.

12. Particulars relating to the Lucy Family.

13. Grant of Free Warren to William Compton.
M. Grant of Fulbroke to Francis Englefyld.
15, 16. Letters mingled with Latin.

17. Complete Copy of the Verses on Sir Thomas Lucy.

18, 19. Letters relating to Stratford.
20. Anecdotes of Sir Walter Ralegh.

VOL. II.

2 M

APPENDIX.

No. I.

24 Nov. 1597. Powley.
To the right honable S'' Thomas Egerton Knighte
Lorde Keper of the greate seale of Englande.

In most humblewise complayninge sheweth unto your
good Lordshipp your dailye orators, John Shakespere of
Stratford upon Avon in the county of Warwicke and
Mary his wief, That whereas your same orators were
lawfully seized in theire demesne as of fee as in the ryghte
of the saide Mary, of and in one messuage and one yarde
lande with thappurtenauncs lyinge and beinge in Wyl-
necote in the saide county. And they beinge thereof so
seised for and in consideracon of the some of fowerty
pounds to them by one Edmounde Lamberte of Barton
on the Heath in the saide countie payde your sayde orators
were content that the saide Edmounde Lamberte should
have and enjoy e the same premisses untill such tyme as
your sayde orators did repaye unto him the saide some of
fowertie pounds ; By reason whereof the saide Edmounde
did enter into the premisses, and did enjoye the same for
the space of three or fower yeares, and thissues and
profytts thereof did receyve and take. After which your
saide orators did tender unto the saide Edmounde the
sayde some of fowertie pounds, and desired that they
mighte have agayne the sayd premisses accordinge to
theire agreement, which money he the sayde Edmounde
then refused to receyve, sayinge that he would not receyve
the same, nor suffer your sayd orators to have the saide
premisses agayne, unlesse they woulde paye unto him
certayne other money which they did owe unto him

2 M 2

532 APPENDIX.

for other matters : All which not withstandinge now so
yt is and yt maye please your good Lopp* that shortelie after
the tendringe of the sayde fowertie pounds to the saide
Edmounde, and the desyre of your sayde orators to have
theire lande agayne from him, he the saide Edmounde at
Barton aforesayde dyed ; after whose deathe one John
Lamberte as sonne and heire of the saide Edmounde
entred into the same premisses, and occupied the same :
after which entrie of the sayde John your sayde orators
came to him and tendred the saide money unto him, and
likewise requested him that he woulde suffer them to have
and enjoye the sayde premisses accordinge to theire righte
and tytle therein, and the promise of his saide father to
your saide orators made, which he the saide John denyed
in all things, and did withstande them for entringe into
the premisses, and as yet doeth so continew still ; And
by reason that certaine deeds and other evydences con-
cerninge the premisses and that of righte belonge to your
saide orators are comme to the hands and possession of
the sayde John, he wrongfully still keepeth and detayneth
the possession of the saide premisses from your saide
orators, and will in no wise permytt and suffer them to
have and enjoye the sayde premisses accordinge to theire
righte in and to the same. And he the saide John Lam-
berte hathe of late made sondrie secreate estates of the
premisses to dyvers persons to your saide orators un-
knowen, whereby your saide orators cannot tell againste
whome to bringe their accons at the comen lawe, for the
recovery of the premisses. In tender consideracon
whereof, and for so muche as your saide orators knowe
not the certaine date nor contents of the saide wrytings,
nor whether the same be contayned in bagge, boxe, or
cheste, sealed, locked or noe, and therefore have no
remedye to recover the same evydencs and wrytings by
the due course of the comen laws of this realme ; and for
that also by reasone of the saide secreate estates so made
by the saide John Lamberte as aforesaide, and want of

APPENDIX.

533

your saide orators havinge of the evidencs and wrytings
as aforesaide, your saide orators cannot tell what accons
or agaynst whome or in what manner to bring theire
accon for the recovery of the premisses at the comen
lawe : And for that also the sayde John Lamberte ys of
greate wealth and abilitie and well frended and alied
amongest gentlemen and freeholders of the countrey in
the saide countie of Warwicke, where he dwelleth, and
your saide orators are of small wealthe and verey fewe
frends and alyance in the saide countie, may yt therefore
please your good Lo^p* to graunt unto your saide orators
the Queenes Ma*'" most gracyous writte of Subpoena to
be directed to the saide John Lamberte comandinge him
thereby at a certaine daie and under a certaine payne
therein to be lymytted personally to appeare before your
good LoPP^ in her ma*'^' highnes corte of Chauncerie, then
and there to answer the premisses, and further to stande
to and abyde suche order and direction therein as to your
good LoPP^ shall seeme best to stande with righte, equitie
and good conscyence. And your sayde orators shall
daylie praye to God for the prosperous healthe of your
good LoPP^ with increase of honor long to contynewe.

J. Stone.

No. II.

Juratus coram me Thoma Legge, 24 November, 1597.

The Answeare of John Lamberte defendte to the Byll of
Complte of John Shakspeere and Mary his wief,
Complts.

The said defendte (savinge to him selfe both nowe and
at all tymes hereafter all advantage of excepcon to the
uncertentie and insufficiencie of the said Complts byll,
and also savinge to this defendte suche advantage as by
the order of this honorable courte he shalbe adjudged to
have for that the like byll in efFecte conteyninge the selfe

534

APPENDIX.

same matter hath byne heretofore exhibited into this
honorable courte againste this defendte, whemnto this
defendte hath made a full and direct answeare, wherin
the said complte hath not proceeded to hearinge,) for a
seconde full and directe answeare unto the said Complts
byll, sayeth. That true yt is (as this defendte verylie
thinkethe) that the said complts were or one of them
was lawfully seized in theire or one of theire demeasne
as 'of fee of and in one messuage and one yearde and
fower acres of lande with thappurtenauncs lyeinge and
beinge in Wylmecott in the parishe of Aston Cauntlowe
in the countie of Warwicke, and that they or one of
them soe beinge thereof seized, the said complte John
Shakspeere by indenture beringe date uppon or aboute
the fowertenth daie of November in the twenteth yeare
of the raigne of our sovereigne lady the Queenes Ma*'^
that now ys, for and in consideracon of the some of
fortie pounds of lawfuU English monney unto the said
complte paide by Edmunde Lamberte this defendts
father in the said byll named, did give, graunte, bargaine,
and sell the said messuage and one yearde and fower
acres of lande with theappurtenauncs unto the said
Edmunde Lamberte and his heires and assignes ; to have
and to holde the said messuage one yearde and fower
acres of lande with thappurtenauncs unto the saide
Edmunde Lamberte his heires and assignes for ever. In
which indenture there is a condicSnall proviso conteyned
that if the said complte did paye unto the said Edmunde
Lamberte the siime of fortie pownds uppon the feast of
S. Michell tharchangell which shoulde be in the yeare of
our Lorde God one thousande fyve hundred and eightie
at the dwellinge house of the said Edmunde Lamberte in
Barton on the heath in the said countie of Warwicke,
that then the said graunte bargaine and sale and all the
covenaunts, graunts and agTeements therein conteyned
shoulde cease and be voyde ; As by the said Indenture
wherunto this defendte for his better certentie doth

APPENDIX.

536

referre him selfe maye appeare. And afterwards the
saide Complte John Shakspeere by his deede pole and
liverie theruppon made did infeofFe the said Edmunde
Lamberte of the said premisses, to have and to holde
unto him the said Edmunde Lamberte and his heires for
ever. After all w^hich in the terme of Ester in the one
and twenteth yeare of the Queenes Ma.'^* raigne that
nowe ys, the said compltes in due forme of lawe did
levye a fyne of the said messuage and yearde lande and
other the premisses before the Queenes Ma*'^* Justics of
the comon plees at Westm' unto the saide Edmunde
Lamberte and his heires sur conuzance de droyt as that
which the said Edmunde had of the gifte of the said
John Shakspeere; as by the said pole deede and the
chirographe of the said fine wherunto this defendte for
his better certentie referreth him selfe yt doth and maye
appeare. And this defendte further sayeth that the said
complte did not tender or paye the said sume of fortie
pownds unto the said Edmunde Lamberte this defendts
father uppon the said feaste daye which was in the yeare
of our Lord God one thowsande fyve hundred and
eightie, according to the said provisoe in the said In-
denture expressed : By reason whereof this defendts
said father was lawfully and absolutely seized of the
said premisses in his demeasne as of fee ; and aboute
eleven years last paste thereof dyed seized. By and
after whose decease the said messuage and premisses
with thappurtenauncs descended and came as of righte
the same oughte to descende and come unto this defendte
as Sonne and next heire of the said Edmunde. By
vertue whereof this defendte was and yet is of the said
messuage, yearde lande, and premisses, lawfully seized
in his demeasne as of fee ; which this defendte hopeth he
oughte both by lawe and equitie to enjoye accordinge to
his lawfull righte and tytle therin. And this defendte
further sayeth that the said messuage yearde lande and
other the said premisses or the moste parte thereof have,

536

APPENDIX.

ever sythence the purches therof by this defendts father,
byne in lease by the demise of the said complte. And
the lease therof beinge nowe somewhat nere expyred,
wherby a greater value is to be yearly raised therby,
they the said complts doe nowe trouble and moleste this
defendte by unjuste sute in lawe, thinkinge therby (as
yt shoulde seme) to wringe from him this defendte some
further recompence for the said premisses then they have
alreddy received ; Without that that yt v^^as agreed that
the said Edmunde Lamberte shoulde have and enjoye the
said premisses in anie other manner & forme (to the
knowledge of this defendte) then this defendte hath in
his said answeare heretofore expressed. And without
that that anie deeds or evidencs concerninge the pre-
misses, that of righte belonge to the said complts, are
come to the hands and possession of this defendte ; as
in the sayd byll is untruly supposed : And without that
that anie other matter cause or thinge in the said complts
byll conteyned materiall or effectual in the lawe to be
answeared unto, towchinge or concerninge him this
defendte, and herein before not answeared unto, con-
fessed & avoyded traversed or denied, is true, to this
defendts knowledge or remembrance, in suche manner &
forme as in the said byll the same is sett downe and
declared. All which matters this defendte is reddy to
averre & prove as this honorable courte shall awarde.
And prayeth to be dismissed ther hence with his rea-
sonable coste and chargs in this wrongfull sute by him
unjustly susteyned. Overbury.

No. IIL

Powle.

The Replicacon of John Shakespere and Mary his wief,
Plent to the Answere of John Lamberte Defend.
The said complaynts for replicacon to the answere of
the said deft saie that theire bill of complaynt ys certayne

APPENDIX.

537

and sufficient in the lawe to be answered : which said
bill and matters therein contayned these comp"^ will
avowe verifie and justifie to be true and sufficient in
the lawe to be answered unto, in si^h sorte manner and
forme as the same be sett forthe and declared in the said
bill; And further they saie that thanswere of the said
defendendte is untrue and insufficient in lawe to be re-
plied unto, for many apparent causes in the same ap-
pearange, thadvantage whereof these Comp.'*^ praie may
be to theym nowe and at all times saved. Then and not
ells for further replicacon to the said answere they saie,
that accordinge to the condicon or proviso mencoed in
the said Indenture of bargaine and sale of the premisses
mencoed in the said bill of complaynt, he this comp.^'
John Shakspere did come to the dwelling house of the
said Edmunde Lamberte in Barton uppon the Heath
uppon the feast daie of St. Michaell tharcheangell which
was in the yeare of our Lorde God one thousand fyve
hundred and eightie \ and then and there tendered to
paie unto him the said Edmunde Lamberte the said fortie
pounds, which he was to paie for the redempcon of the
said premisses, which some the said Edmunde did refuse
to receyve, sayinge that he owed him other money, and
unles that he the said John would paie him altogether as
well the said fortie pounds as the other money which he
owed him over and above, he would not receyve the said
fortie pounds, and immediatlie after he the said Edmunde
dyed ^, and by reason thereof he the said def entered
into the said premisses and wrongfullie kepeth and de-
tayneth the said premisses from him the said comp^^
Without that, that any other matter or thinge material 1
or effectuall for these comp'^^ to replie unto and not herein
sufficientlie confessed and avoyded denyed and traversed
all which matters and things this complaynants are redie
to avere and prove as this honorable co'^t will awarde.

' Eight, in orig.

* E. L. died in 1586, according to the account of his son John.

538

APPENDIX.

Aad praie as' before in theire said bill they have
praied. J. Stone.

No. IV.

In the name of God, Amen, the xxiiij*'' daye of
November in the yeare of our lord God 1556, in the third
and the forthe yeare of the raygne of our soveraigne
Lord and lady, Phylipe and Mary, kyng and queue, &c.
I Robert Arden of Wylmcote in the paryche of Aston
Cauntlow, secke in bodye and good and perfitt of remem-
berance, make this my last will and testament, in manner
and forme folowynge.

" Fyrst, I bequethe my solle to allmyghty God and to our
blessed laydye sent Marye, and to all the holye companye
of heven, and my bodye to be beryde in the church yarde
of Seynt Jhon the baptyst in Aston aforsayde.

" Also I geve and bequeth to my youngste dowghter
Marye all my lande in Willmecote, cawlide Asbyes & the
crop upon the ground sowne and tyllede as hit is. And
xiijs. iiijfi. of money to be payde ovr ere my goodes
be devydede. Also I gyve & bequethe to my daughter
Ales the thyrde parte of all ray goodes moveable &
unmoveable in fylde and town, after my detts and leggeses
be performyde, besydes that goode she hath of her owne
att this tyme. Also 1 gyve and bequethe to Agnes my
wife yili. xiijs. iiijd?. upon this condysione, that [she] shall
sofer my daughter Alice quyetlye to ynyoye halfe my
copye hould in Wylmcote duryng the tyme of hir wyddowe-
whodde : and if she will nott sofFer my daughter Ales
quyetlye to occupye halfe with her, then I will that my
wyfe shall have but iijZz. vi5. viijJ. & her ginture in
Snytherfyelde.

" Item, I will that the resdew of all my goodes move-
able & unmoveable, my funeralles & my dettes dys-
chargyde I gyve and bequethe to my other children to be
equallye devydide amongeste them by the descrysyon of
Adam Palmer Hugh Porter of Snytterfyld & Jhon Sher-

APPENDIX.

539

lett, whom I do orden & make my overseres of this my
last will & testament, & they to have for ther peynes
taking in this behalfe xxs. apese. AUso I ordin & con-
stytute & make my full executores Ales & Marye my
daughteres of this my last will & testament, and they to
have no more for ther peynes takyng nar as afore geven
them. Also 1 gyve & bequethe to every house that hath
no teme in the parish of Aston to every howse injd,
Thes beyng wyttnesses,

" Wylliam Bowton, Curatt.
" Adam Palmer.
Jhon Sherlett
Thomas Jhenkes
" William Pytt
" with other more
" Probat fuit &c. Wigorn. &c. xvii°J. die mensis
Decembris anno dni 1556."

The Will of Agnes Arden, the widow of Robert Arden,
was proved at Worcester, March 31, 1584. The precise
date I am unable exactly to ascertain, as that part of the
paper which contained it has been worn away by time ;
but it was made in the 21st year of Queen Elizabeth
(1579) ; and it appears from the Register of Aston Cantlow,
as I have already mentioned, that she was buried there
Dec''. 29, 1580. From her will, I learn that she did suffer
her daughter Alice quietly to enjoy the moiety of the
copyhold mentioned by her husband, for she devises to
J" Hill her part or moiety of the neat crop in the fields,
paying the Lord's rent. It appears that John Hill and
John Fulwood had married two of the sisters of Mary
Shakspeare. To each of the children of John Hill and
John Fulwood she gives a sheep ; to the poor of Aston
Cantlow ten shillings ; to Avery Fulwood two sheep ;
to Richard Petifer one sheep ; to John Page and his wife
(who perhaps was also her daughter), vis. viiic?. ; to Joan
Lambard, xiid, ; to John Hill her best platter of the best
sort and her best platter of the second sort; one porringer,

540

APPENDIX.

one saucer, and one candlestick ; two pair of sheets, her
second pot, and best pan ; to her son-in-law, John Fulwood,
all the rest of her household stuff ; and one brown steer
two years old ; to. each of her brother Alexander Webbe's
children, twelve-pence. She makes John Fulwood and
John Hill her executors and residuary legatees, in trust
for their children ; and Adam Palmer and George Gibbs
overseers of her will, which is witnessed by Thomas
Edkins, Richard Petifer, " with others

*^ The Inventorye of the goodes moveable & unmove-
able of Robert Ardennes of Wylmcote late dessesid made
the ix*^ daye of Decemb"^ in the thyrde & the fourth e
yeare of the raygne of our soveraygne lord and ladye
PhylipeSc Marye king & quene, &c. 1556.

" Imprimis, in the halle ij table hordes, iij choyeres,
ij formes, one cobbourde, ij coshenes, iij benches & one
lytle table with shelves, presede att viiis.

" lb. ij peyntide clothes in the hall & v peynted clothes
in the chamber, vij peire of shettes, ij cofferes one which
presede at xviiijs.

" lb. V borde clothes, ij Toweles Sc one dyeper towell,
presed att vis. \n^d.

lb. one fether bedde, ij mattereses, vijj canvases, one
coverlett, iij bosteres, one pilowe, iiij peyntide clothes,
one whyche presed att xxvjs. viij J.

" lb. in the kechen iiij panes, iiij potts, iij candell
stykes, one bason, one chafyng dyche, ii cathernes
[caldrons], ij shelletts, one frying pane, a gredyerene &
pott hangynges with hookes, presed att Ijs. viij^i.

" lb. one broche, a paire of cobbardes, one axe, a bill,
iiij nagares [augres] ij hatchetts, an ades, a mattock,
ayren crowe, one fat, iiij barrelles, iiij payles, a gyrne, a
knedynge trogh, along seve, a hand saw, presed at xx5. '\]d,
lb. viij oxen, ij bollokes, vij kyne, iiij weynyng caves,
xxiiij//.

" lb. iijj horses, iij colts presed att vijj//.
lb. Ito [52] shepe presed att vij//.

APPENDIX. 541

" lb, the whate in the barnes, & the barley, presed att
xviij/z.

lb. the heye & the pease, ottes & the strawe, presed
att iij/z. vis. \n}d.

lb. ix swyne presed att xxvis. viij^?.
" lb. the bees &powltrye presed att V5.
*' lb. carte & carte geres, & plogh & plogh geres with
harrowes, presed att xli.

lb. the wodd in the yarde, & the batten in the roffe,
presed att, xxxs.

" lb. the wheate in the fylde, presed att \Ui, xiijs. iiijd.
Sum totalis, Ixxvij/. xjs. xd.

No. V,

To all & singuler noble 8c gentilmen of what estate or
degree bearing arms to whom these psents shall come
Willm Dethick als Garter principal king of arms sendeth
greetings. Know yee that whereas by the authoritie pri-
vilege & custome pertaining to my said office of principal
king of arms from the Quenes most exc. ma*^ and her
highnes most noble & verteous progenitors I am to take
general notice and to make publique demonstracon &
testimonie of all causes of arms & matters of gentrie
through out all herma^^^kingdomes and dominions, princi-
paletes, isles, & provinces To thend that As some by
there auncyent names families kindreds & descents have
& enjoy sunderie enseignes & [cotes] of arms, so other for
there valiant feats magnanimitie vertue degnites & desserts
maye have such marks & tokens of honor & worthinesse,
whereby there name & good fame shal be [known] &
divulged and there children & posteritie in all vertue &
service of there prynce & contrie [encouraged] Being
therfore solicited &- by credible report informed that John
Shakespeare of Stratford upon Avon in the countie of

p:ireiit and late

Warwick, whose ^ antecessors were for there valeant &
faithfull services advaunced & rewarded of the most

542

APPENDIX.

prudent prince king Henry the Seventh of famous
memorie, sithence whiche time they have continewed at
those parts in good reputation & credit ; [and that the said
John having maryed Mary, daughter and one of the hcyres of Robert
Arden of Wilmecote, in the same countie, gent-] In consideration
whereof and for encouragement of his posteretie I have
therefore assigned graunted and by these have confirmed
this shield or cote of arms, viz Gould, on a bend sable &
a Speare of the first, the point steeled, proper ; and his
crest or cognizance, a faulcon, his vv^ings displayd, argent
standing on a wrethe of his coullors supporting a speare
gould Steele as aforesaid, sett uppon a helmet with man-
tells & tassells as hath been accustomed & more playnly
appereth depicted in this margent &c &c ^

At the office of Arms London the xx^*' daye of
October in the xxxix*'* yeare of the raigne of our Sove-
raigne Lady Elizabeth &c A* 1596."

" The xxxix*^^ year," &c. is a mistake ; it should be the
xxxviii**" year : for the 20th of October, 1596, was in the
38th of Elizabeth. And so it stands in the other draft.

In the copy numbered 24, in the passage with which
we are principally concerned, an interlineation directs us
instead of — ** whose parents and late antecessors for
their faithful and valiant services," &c. to read — " whose
grandfather for his faithful and valiant services," &c.

The following grant made in 1599, is found in a book
marked R 21 (formerly G. 13) p. 347.

To all and singuler noble and gentlemen of all estats
and degrees, bearing arms, to whom these presents shall
come, William De thick. Garter, Principall King of Arms
of England, and William Camden, alias Clarencieuix,
King of Arms for the south, east, and west parts of this
realme, sendethe greeting. Know ye, that in all nations
and kingdoms the record and remembraunce of the
valeant facts and vertuous dispositions of worthie men
have been made knowne and divulged by certeyne shields

No mention of impaling these arms with those of Arden.

APPENDIX.

543

of arms and tokens of chevalrie ; the grant and testimonie
whereof apperteyneth unto us, by vertue of our offices
from the Queues most Exc. Majestie, and her Highenes
most noble and victorious progenitors : wherefore being
solicited, and by credible report informed, that John
Shakspeare, now of Stratford upon Avon, in the counte
of Warwick, gent, whose parent and great grandfather,
late antecessor, for his faithefull and approved service to
the late most prudent prince, king Henry VII. of famous
memorie, was advaunced and rewarded with lands and
tenements, geven to him in those parts of Warwickshere,
where they have continwed by some descents in good
reputacion and credit ; and for that the said John Shak-
speare having maryed the daughter and one of the heyrs
of Robert Arden of Wellingcote, in the said countie, and
also produced this his auncient cote of arms, heretofore
assigned to him whiles t he was her Majesties officer and
baylefe of that towne ; In consideration of the premisses,
and for the encouragement of his posteritte, unto whom
suche blazon of arms and achevements of inheritance
from theyre said mother, by the auncyent custome and
law^es of arms, maye lawfully descend ; We the said
Garter and Clarencieux have assigned, graunted, and by
these presents exemplefied unto the said John Shak-
speare, and to his posteritie, that shield and cote of arms,
viz. In a field of gould upon a bend sables a speare of the
first, the poynt upward, hedded argent ; and for his crest
or cognisance, A falcon with his wyngs displayed, stand-
ing on a wrethe of his coullers, supporting a speare
armed hedded, or steeled sylver, fyxed uppon a helmet
with mantell and tassells, as more playnely maye appeare
depected on this margent ; and we have likewise uppon
on other escucheon impaled the same with the auncyent
arms of the said Arden of Wellingcote ; signifieng therby,
that it maye and shalbe lawful! for the said John Shak-
speare, gent, to beare and use the same shield of arms,
single or impaled, as aforsaid, dvring his naturall lyffe ;
and thut it shalbe lawful! for his children, yssue, and pos-

544

APPENDIX.

teryte, (lawfully begotten,) to beare, use, and quarter, and
show forth the same, with theyre dewe differences, in all
lawfull warlyke facts and civile use or exercises, accord-
ing to the lawes of arms, and custome that to gentlemen
belongethe, without let or interuption of any person or
persons, for use or bearing the same. In wyttnesse and
testemonye whereof we have subscrebed our names, and
fastened the seals of our offices, geven at the Office of
Arms, London, the * day of in the xlii yere

of the reigne of our most gratious Sovraigne lady Eliza-
beth, by the grace of God, quene of Ingland, France, and
Ireland, defender of the faith, &c. 1599."

In this grant it appears that the words which I have
had occasion so particularly to consider, stood originally
whose parent and antecessor,'' for which were next sub-
stituted whose parent and late antecessor ; " and after-
wards, "whose great grandfather" was adopted. Ac-
cordingly, Mr. Anstis, when he copied this instrument
for Mr. Pope, in 1523, thus exhibited it. But the former
draught (No. 24), we see, was right — " whose grand-
father," &c. The cause of this error has been pointed out
already. See Section II. p. 28.

No. VI.

Secunda pars patentium de anno regni Regis Henrici
Septimi decimo septimo.

De coNCEssioNE Ardern, m. 30.
R. oinib} ad quos &c. sattm Sciatis qd in consideracoe
boni & veri ?vicij quod dilcus ?viens nf Robtus Ardern
unus garcionu canle nre ante hec tempora nob impendit ac
durante vita sua impendere intendit Dedim^ & concessim^
eidem Robto officii! custodis parvi parci nfi de Aldercar
Hend & gaudend dcm officii! dco ?vienti nro p se vel p ejus
deputatu sufficients durante beneptito nro cum vadijs &

^ Between 17 Nov. 1599, and 25 March, 1599—1600,

APPENDIX.

545

feodis eidem officio debitis & consuetis Hend & annuatim
pcipiend in modo 8c forma ante hec tempera usitat ad
Sminos ibidem usuales simul cum omimod pficuis comodi-
tatib} & advantagijs eidem officio quovismodo ptinen seu
spectan In cujus &c. T. R. apud Westrri xxij die
Februarij .

P bfe de privato sigillo & de dal &c.

De concessione Ardern, m. 35.
R. omibj ad quos &c. saitm Sciatis qd nos de gra nra
spali ac in consideracoe boni & veri ?vicij quod dilcus Pviens
nr Robtus Ardern unus garcionu carSe nre nob impendit ac
durante vita sua impendere intendit Dedim^ & concessim^
eidem Robto officia ballivi dnij nri de Codnore & custodis
parci nri ibidem Hend & occupand eadem officia p se vel
p sufficientem deputatum suu sive sufficientes deputatos suos
durante beneptito nro cum vadijs feodis pficuis comoditatib3
& advantagijs eisdem officijs debitis & consuetis Hend &
annuatim pcipiend in modo & forma ante hec tempora usita?
In cujus &c. T,R. apud Westrn ix die Septembf.

P bre de privato sigillo & de dat &c.

Prima pars paten de anno regni Regis Henrici Septimi
vicesimo tertio, m. 12.

D' custod' coMiss' Ardern.
R. omib} ad quos &c. salutem. Sciatis nos in considera-
coe 9i & fidelis %ic\] qd dilcus & fidelis ?viens nf Robtus
Ardern pantea impendit & durante vita sua impendere
intendit concessisse tradidisse & ad firmam dimisisse eidem
Robto ma8iu de Yoxsall in com Staff cum ptin' necnon
cum omib} alijs pficuis &: comoditatib} quibuscunq^ eidem
marJio ptin sive spectan unacum pficuis vis francipleg dci
maflij vidett finibj pquis ptitis & arSciamentis (eo^dem
wardis maritagijs relevijs boscis advocacoib} ecctia^ bonis &
catallis felon aut fugitiv & thesauf invent omino exceptis ac
nob & heredib} nris reservat) Hend tenend & occupand
VOL. II. 2! N

646

APPENDIX.

Jdcm mafiiu cum ptin ut pmitti? exceptis pexcep? pfato
Robto heredib} Sc assign suis a festo Sci Michis Archi px
^ futur usqj finem 8c Sminii viginti unius anno^ extunc px
sequen & plenarie complend Reddendo inde annuatim nob
8c hered nris regib} Angt durante ?mino pdco quadraginta
duas libras put respons fuim^ antea & quadraginta solidos
ultra de incro solvend ad ?minos ibidem usuales ad manus
recept.oris nri ibidem p tempore existen Proviso tamen qd
dcus Robtus & pleg sui de omimod repacoib} dci mafJij cum
ptin exorJat sint &c p nos vel ad custus nros faciend tociens
quociens opus sive necesse fuit durante ?mino pdco In
cujus &CC. T. R. apud Otford, xxiiij die Septembf.

P bre de privato sigillo 8c de dat &c.

No. VIIL

The following list of the Bailiffs of Stratford from the
time their first charter was granted to the year 1615, is
formed from the various ancient documents in the chamber
of Stratford :

1553. Thomas Gilbert, the first

Bailif.

1554. William Whatley, elect-

ed in ^ep' for the en-
suing year.

1555. John Burbadge.

1556. Ralph Cawdrey, alias

Coke.

1557. Francis Harbadge.

1558. Robert Perrot.

1559. Adrian Quiney.

1560. Roger Sadler.

1561. Lewis ap Williams.

1562. Humphrey Plymley.

1563. George Whatley.

1564. Richard Hill.

1565. JohnWheler.

1566. William Tyler.

1567. Ralph Cawdrey.

1568. John Shakspeare.

1569. Robert Salisbury.
1570 John Sadler.

1571. Adrian Quiney.

1572. Roger Sadler.

1573. Lewis ap Williams.

1574. Humphrey Plymley.

1575. Richard Hill.'

1576. John Wheler.

1577. William Tyler.

1578. Thomas Barber.

1579. Nicholas Barnehurst.

1580. Robert Salisbury.

1581. Ralph Cawdrey.

1582. Adrian Quiney.

No. VII.

GENEALOGY OF ROBERT ARDEN, SHAKSPEARE'S MATERNAL GRANDFATHER.

Walter Aiderne,
Ob. 1502.

Eleanor, daughter of John Hampden,
in the county of Bucks, Esq.

I 2.
Eliz., = John Arderne, born pro- -
uxorse- bably in 1455. Squire
cunda. for the body to Henry
VII. Died June 4,
1426, (fl) aged 71-

: Alice, d. of Ri-
chard Bracebridge,
Esq. whom John Ar-
derne married in
Feb. 1473.

1 2.

Robert Arderne, .
living in 1526, Cg-) '
married probably
in 1484, aged 26.

Heliry. Wi

illiam.

I 3
Thomas Arderne, :
borri in or before 1484,
(6) married in or be-
fore 1508 ; died Jan.
28, 1562-3, (c) aged
about 78.

Mary, d. of
Thomas An-
drews, of Char-
walton, Esq.

I 4.
William Arden, :
bom probably in 1 509,
being married in or
before 1530. Died
June 7, 1544, aged
about 35. id)

Elizabeth, d.
ofEdwardCon-
way, of Lud-
dington and
Arrow, Esq.

Robert Arderne, :
Groom of the Chamber
to Henry VII. Bom
probably in 1585, and
17 years old when he
obtained his &st grant
(/t). Married probably
in or about the year
1510, aged 25.

Simon. Richard. Edward.

I 4.

Robert Arderne, = Agnes Webbe.
born probably in or
about 1511 ; and mar-
ried in 1535; aged 24.
Died in Dec. 1556.

Edward Arden, born =
June 29, 1531. (e)
Executed for High
Treason 1584, aged 53.
—In 38 Henry VIII.
in ward to Sir Robert
Throckmorton, whose
daughter he afterwards
married.

Mary, third
d. of Su Robert
Throckmorton,
Knight. (/)

Two other
daughters.

I 5.

Mary, born pro- == John Shakspeare,

bably in 1639, died
at Stratford, SepU
9, 1608, aged about

married probably in
the year 1557: died
at Stratford, Sept. 8,
1602, aged about 72.

Joan,
ob. s. p.

Margaret,
ob. s. p.

WILLIAM, born = Anne Hathaway

April 23, 1564; died
April 23, 1616.

bom in 1556 ; died in
Aug. 1623.

Joan. = William Hart.

William, Mary,
Thomas, Michael.

Anne,
ob. s. p

Richard,
ob. s. p.

Edmond,
ob. s. p.

Susanna. = John Hall.

Thomash Nash = Elizabeth, born Feb.

1607-8; died in Feb.
1669-70, s. p.

Judith. = Thomas Quiney.

Shakspeare.

(n) Esc. 18 Henry VIII. p. 1, i
(«) Esc. 1 Ed. VI. p. 2, n. 75.

(6) Ibid. (c) Esc. 5 Eliz. p. 1, n. 2.
if) MS. in Off. Arm. Miscellanea, 10.

(i) Esc. 37 Henry VIII. Esc 1 Ed. VI. p. 2, n. 75 ; and Esc 5 EUz. p. 1, n. 2.
(g) "Will of Sir John Arderne, Parch, qu. 8. ih) Pat 17 Henry VIL p. 1, m. 12.

[To face p. 546, vol. ii.]

APPENDIX.

547

158iJ. George Vv' hateley.
1584^. Richard Hill.

1585. William Tyler.

1586. Thomas Barber.

1587. Robert Salisbury.

1588. William Wilson.

1589. Thomas Rogers.

1590. William Parsons.

1591. John Gibbes.

1592. Richard Quiney.

1593. Henry Wilson.

1594. Thomas Barber.

1595. Thomas Rogers.

1596. Abraham Sturley.

1597. John Gibbes.

1598. John Smythe.

1599. John Sadler.

1600. Henry Wilson.

1601. Richard Quiney died in

office. John Gibbes,
suffectus.

1602. Daniel Baker.

J 603. Frances Smyth, senior.

1604. John Smyth.

1605. William Wyett.

1606. John Gybbes.

1607. Henry Walker.

1608. Francis Smyth, Jun\

1609. Henry Wilson.

1610. William Walford.

1611. William Parsons.

1612. John Sadler.

1613. Daniel Baker.

1614. Francis Smyth, Sen'.

1615. Julius Shaw.

No. IX.

" Ultimo die fFebruary Anno regni regis Edw. sexti sep-
timo pro Bullivo et Burgensibus burgi de Stratford super
Avon, in com. Warr.

*^ The kinges Maiesties pleasm'e is that the Borough of
Stratforde vpon Avon in the County of Warr. shalbe
Incorporated by the name of the Baylif and Burgesses
of the Borough of Stratford vpon Avon.

Also his highnes pleasure is that the Almes house in
the said Borough shall Continue and be maynteyned for
ever, and that there shalbe alwaye kepte there xxiiij
poore men and women, and that the saide Baylife and
Burgesses shall distribute and paye wekely to every of the
said poore folke, iiijc?.

Also that there shalbe one grammer Scole for ever to
be kept in the said Borough for the good educacion and
brynginge vp of the youth And that the Scolemaster of
the said Scole shall haue for his Wages and Stipende xx/.
by yeare, whiche Scolemaster shall from tyme to tyme be

2 N 2

548

APPENDIX.

Appointed and Assigned by the high Myghtie prynce,
John Duke of Northumberland and his heyres and
assignes, Lordes of the said Boroughe.

" Also that there shalbe kept wekelie in the said
Borough one markett every Thursdaye through the yeare.
And also two ffayres there yerelie, the one on the ffeast of
the Exaltacion of the holy Crosse [Sep. M] and the evyn
and morrow of the same feast, And the other one [on] the
ffeast of the Invention of the holy Crosse [May 3] and the
morrowe of the same ffeaste. And that the said Bayliff and
Burgesses shall have the profits and Revenues of the said
markett and ffayres. Also that there shalbe kept every xv
daies in the said Borough [before the Bailif for the time,
being a court of record to hear and determine all personal
actions of debt, accompt, trespass and defence, arising
within the jurisdiction of the said borough] soe that the
same excede not the some of one hundred shillings. And
that the said Bayliffe and Burgesses shall take the profitts
of the said Courtes. Also his highnes further pleasure is,
that the said Baylif and Burgesses shall have a licence to
purchase landes tenements and heredytaments to the
Clere yerelie value of two hundred marks.

Also because the parishe of Stratford vpon Avon is
a grate parishe havinge the number of fifteen hundred
people to receyve the Communion, and is in Circuyte
xiiij Myles at the leaste, there shall be A Vicare endowed
in the said Borough, whiche shall serve the cure in the
parishe Churche there, and hee to haue for his wages xxl.
yerelie to be paid by the handes of the said Baylyf and
Burgesses ; and that the same Vicare shalbe presented and
appointed by the said Duke of Northumberland his grace,
and his heyres and Assignes Lordes of the said Borough ;
and that there shalbe one other preste or Chapplayne to
be assistaunt to serve in the saide Churche who shall haue
for his stipende yerelie xL

And in Consideracion of all whiche premisses the
Kinges Maiestie is pleased and Contented to giue and
graunte to the said Baylyf and Burgesses all the landes.

APPENDIX.

549

tenements, rentes, reversions, services, tithes, pencions,
porcions, and hereditaments in the particlers hereunto
annexed, to them and theire Successors for ever. There-
fore make a graunt thereof to them Accordingly.

" Ry. Sakevyle."
The sentence within crotchets was omitted, by the
negligence of the amanuensis, in the copy of this warrant
preserved in the chamber of Stratford. I have therefore
supplied it, from an inspection of the charter itself. It is
observable that in the charter the jurisdiction is extended
from five pounds to thirty pounds.

No. X.

** This Inventory made the XXVP'^ Day of July in the
Yere of the Reigne of Kynge Edwarde the HIP'* after the
Conqueste the XV*'' Yere of divers Goodes and Juelles
beynge in the Gildehalle of Stratforde uppon Avon
delivered the seide Day and Yere in kapynge to John
Hoggekyns and John Samwell then Proketours of the
seide Gilde In the Tyme of Roger Pagette then Maister
yf the seide Gilde.

In the furste. InthePantery and Botery A Stondynge
Cuppe of Selver with A Kevercle of Selver gylded by
the Bordurs. Item A Grete Maser callud Pardon Maser
A Boude with Selver and overgylte with IIII Oches in
the Bothom gylded A Grete Owche in the Myddes graven
with a Crucyfix our Lady and Seynt John Baptiste. —
Item a nodur Maser broken at John Oxton Weddynge
with a Bonde of Selver and overgyit with a Nowche in
the Botom of our Lady Selver and overgylte with IIII
Hedes of Selver and overgilte and IIII Small thyn plats
of Selver and overgylte in the same Maser. Item a nodur
Maser with a Nowche in the Botom with a Beeste therein
of Selver and overgilte and II Plates of Selver and
overgilte and the Bonde of Selver and overgylte. Item
a nodur Lasse Maser, with a brode Bonde of Selver and
Overgilte, and a Nowche in the Botom with a Rose of

550

APPENDIX.

Selver and overgilte. Item II Dosen Spones of Selver
with flatte gyldyn Knottes at the Ende. Item III flatte
Bason of Laten with II Lavers of Laten one withoute a
Lydde. Item II Salte Salers. Item a Brason Morter
with a pestoUe of Bras. Item a Longe Cofur in the
Countynghouse. Item too Laduls of Bras. Item II
Skymers of Bras. Item a Flech Hooke. Item III Steyned
Clothes for the Halle. Item a Grater for Brede. Item
for the Halle a Borde Clothe conteynyng IX EUes and
more. Item a nodur Clothe conteynynge VI Elles and a
halfe. Item a nodur Borde Clothe conteynynge VIII
Elles and a Quarter. Item a nodur Borde Clothe con-
teynynge X Elles. Item a nodur Borde Clothe con-
teynynge V Elles and a halfe. Item a Borde Clothe of
Dyapre Werke conteynynge II 1 1 Elles and a halfe.
Item a nodur playne olde Borde Cloth conteynynge IlII
Elles and halfe a Quarter. Item a nodur Mete Clothe
conteynynge VI Elles. Item a nodur Borde Clothe con-
teynynge VII Elles and III Quarters. Item a nodur
Borde Clothe conteynynge VIII Elles. Item IIII Olde
Towelles one of them conteynyge III Elles and III Quar-
ters. Item A nodur conteynynge II Elles. Item a nodur
conteynynge III Elles. Item a nodur conteynynge U
Elles and III Quarters. Item IIII. Item II Panttery
Clothes newe bougt. Item IIII Crete Chargers. Item
Xlll Dosen Platers and II Peces. Item XIX Dosen
Potengers of Pewtur and VII Peces. Item X Dosen
Sawcers and VIII Peses of Pewter. Item II Cofurs with
Evydences in the Botery. Item II Awndyrons in the
Countynghouse. Item a Grete Standarde Potte of Bras,
in the Store House. Item IX odur Grete Potts of Bras
in the seid House. Item III small brason potts. Item
nil Grete Pannys thre of them conteynynge Gaines
a nodur conteynynge Galnys. Item a panne broken.
Item II Pannys one of them conteynynge IIII. G. a
nodur III. G. 8c di. Item II odur Lytell pannys on of
them broken near the Bordur. Item a nodur panne yeven
by Alson Thorne conteynynge VII Gallnos in the Kychen.

APPENDIX.

561

Item II Meles, a more and a lasse. Item II Tren. Plats.
Item II rounde Grete Broches. Item IIII Grete Square
Broches. Item II odur Square Broches. Item II Peyre
of Yron Rakkes. Item a Grete Brand Yron. Item II
Trowes of Tree. Item a Peyre of Grete Cobertes yeven
by Sir Nycolas Leke stondynge in the Kychyn. Item
thre Theles. Item III Bordes in the Store House. Item
a Spynnynge Whele for Flax. Item a Brasen potte broken
by the Egge by the queste of Alson Thorne. Item VII
Bordes in the Over Halle. Item III Farmes, Item IIII
Tressulles. Item a potte yeven by Mawde Furbour by
John Gilberts Tyme conteynynge III G. Item I Savi^yng
Ax of John Lever, Bocher. Item II Clevers in the
Countyng House of the seid John.

" Item delyvered to the seide Procutors beynge in the
Gilde Chapelle videlit Vestiments, Awter Clothes,
Chaleys, w^ith odur Goodes beynge in the seyde Chapelle.

Furste. A Peyre of Vestmentes of Blake Velvet nev^^e
bougte by Roger Pagette with all the Reparelle. Item a
newe blac Coope bought by the seide Roger. Item a
nodur Peyre of Blake Vestymentes vv^ith all the Reparelle
yeven by Sir William Bischoppeston Knygte of Clothe
of Golde. Item a nodur Peyre Vestimentes of blew^e
with all the Reparelle to them with Kateryn Wheles.
Item a nodur Peyre rede Vestymentes with the Reparell
to them with Lyons. Item a peyre of blac Damaske
Vestimentys with all the Reparelle to them. Item a nodur
Peyre of Vestiments of Grene Domasay with the Reparell
at Seynte John Awter in the Chapelle. Item a nodur
Peyre to the seide Awter of Grene and Ray with all the
Reparelle to them. Item a White Chasepull of Bordaly-
saunder. Item II Chaleys one overgylte and the odur
Gyldud in the Bordur and within. Item II Masse Bokes.
Item II Frontelles one of the Trinite and a nodur rede
and blewe. Item a Frontell to Seynt Jouhn Awter with
Roses and Letters of Golde. Item a nodur Frontell to
the seid Awter steyned with Seynte John Baptiste and
the Ymage of our Lady. Item a nodur Frontell to the

552

APPENDIX.

seide Awter steyned with the Trinite and Seynt John
Baptiste. Item VII Awter Clothes to the Hye Awter,
Item V Towelles to the seide Awter. Item a Frontell
steyned with the Lyfe of Seynte Elyn. Item IIII Awter
Clothes to Seynte John Awter. Item II Towelles to the
seide Awter. Item V Corporoos with III Kevlyngs,
Item V Cofurs. Item II Tynacles of Blewe with Lylyes
and Potts with the Vestyments of the same Sute. Item
V Baners and a Stremer, one of the Trinite. Item a blac
Coope by Sir WiUiam Bysshoppeston Yfte. Item a
Crosse of Selver and overgylte. Item a nodur Crosse of
Coper and gyldud with a Foote therto. Item a nodur
Crosse broken of Copur and overgylte. Item II Palles
one of Selke of White and a nodur rede beton with
Goolde. Item II blewe Clothes to kover the Awters
withall. Item II Pelowes of Selke. Item a Crete Glas.
Item II Paxes. Item II Crete Candelstykes of Laten.
Item II smalle Candelstykes of Laten for the Awters.
Item A Sorpleys.

Item delyvered to the Procutours all the Vestymentes
Awter Clothes Chaleys with odur Goodes beynge in the
Churche for our Lady Awter and Seynte John Awter.

Furste II Coopes of Rede and Grene with Lyons of
Golde. Item a nodur Coope of rede Bawkyn with Byrdes
of Golde. Item a nodur Coope of Grene Bawkyn with
Swannys. Item a nodur Coope Grene and Blewe with Lylyes
in Pottes. Item a Vestement with Lylyes in Pottes. Item a
Vestemente of Blac Clothe of Gold. Item a Vestement of
white Damaske. Item a Palle braunched with Roses and
Flowers. Item a Awter Clothe of Dyapre Werke. Item
II Towell of Dyapre Werke. Item Awter Clothe of playne
Threde. Item II shorte Towelles of Samplyry Werke*
Item an Olde Towell of Dyapre Werke. Item an Awter
Clothe with a Frontell of Selke sowed to hit. Item a
Clothe to honge afore our Lady in Lente. Item III
Pelowes of Selke. Item a Chales gylded. Item a Masse
Booke. [tem a Brussh of Pekoks Fedurs. Item a Case
of Selke browdered with Perles for a Corporos. Item a

APPENDIX.

553

Pax. Item II Standerdes of Laten. Item II smalle
Candelstykes of Laten. Item an Olde Glas. Item a
Cheseble of Grene with Serpentes Hedes. Item an Olde
Towelle. Item a Cheseble of Grene and White Cadas
with an Awbe and the Reparell to hit. Item an Awter
Clothe of Dyapre Werke with a Frontell sowed thereto
Item a Awter Clothe of white Threde. Item a Clothe of
blewe Carde to cover the Awter. Item a Peyre of Cruetts
of Pewter. Item II steyned Clothes to honge afore the
Awter one of our Lady with thre Maryes a nodur of the
Coronacon of our Lady All thes Perteyneth to our Lady
Awter. Item II Cofurs. Item to the Roode Awter a
Peyre of Vestimentes of rede powdered Selke. Item a
Peyre of Vestimentes of sangwen Cadas. Item an Awter
Clothe with a Frontell sowed thereto. Item II odur
Awter Clothes on of them of Dyapre Werke. Item a
Clothe of Blewe Bokeram to cover the Awter. Item a
Clothe steyned with the Trinite and a Crucifyx. Item a
Pax. Item a lytell Frontell steyned. Item a Peyre of
Cruetts. Item a Clothe of Herre nex the Awter. Item a
small Cofur. Item a Candlesteke of Laten. Item at
Seyns John Awter II Peyre of Vestyments, on Peyre of
rede Selke, a nodur of Grene Trede. Item a Palle with
Bests and Branches. Item II Candelstykes of Laten.
Item a Masse Booke with a Chaleys overgylte. Item an
Awter Clothe with a Frontell sowed to hit. Item a Towell
of Dyapre Werke. Item a Towell of playn Clothe. Item
a steyned Clothe of Seynte Gregory. Item a Clothe of
Frene and Blewe for Lente to honge afore the Ymages.
Item II odur Awter Clothes one of them with a Frontell
beten with Goolde. Item a steyned Clothe hongyng
afore the Awter with Seynte John Baptiste with odur.
Item a Pax. Item a Corporos with a Case of Selke.
Item a Case of Twyggs to here the Chaleys yn. Item II
Cofurs. Item II Cruetts. Item II Cofurs in the Rode
Lofte.'^

On the back of the inventory :

554

APPENDIX.

" Item IX Plates in the Kychyn. Item IIII Potengers.
Item IIII Sawcers."

No. XI.

The Will of Ralph Shawe, a friend of Mr. John Shaks-
peare, and the father of Julius Shawe, our poet's friend,
which was proved before the Rev. Mr. Bramhall, Oct. 15,
1592, (the Vicar there having a peculiar jurisdiction, as
the Warden of the College of Stratford had before its dis-
solution), begins thus :

" In the name of God, Amen, the xviiith daye of

March in the yeare of our Lord God 1591, 1, Ralph

Shawe of Stratford upon Avon in the county of Warwick,
Wool-driver, being weake in body,*' &c. His stock of
wool, as appears from his inventory, was twenty-one
tods, which were estimated at 20/. — In a distringas issued
by Mr. Thomas Greene, town-clerk of Stratford, to the
Serjeants at mace, to summon a jury for the approaching
Quarter Sessions, 25 May, 1608, the name of George
Shackleton, wool-driver, occurs. To drive feathers, is a
term still in use.

Several branches of the woollen manufacture appear
to have flourished at Stratford in the reign of Queen
Elizabeth : Thus, 1 find frequent mention of dyers,
wool-winders (see Stat. 23 Henry VIII. c. 17), card-
makers, broad-weavers, fullers, and shearmen or cloth-
workers : but towards the end of her reign it seems to
have somewhat declined ; for in A Supplication from the
Bailif and Burgesses to the Lord Treasurer Burghley,
dated Nov. 9, 1590, and preserved in the Chamber of
Stratford, is the following paragraph :

And whereas the said towne is now fallen much into
decay, for want of such trade as heretofore they had by
clothinge and makinge of yarne, ymploying and mayn-
tayninge a number of poore people by the same, which
now live in great penury and miserie, by reason they are
not set at worke as before they have ben."

APPENDIX.

665

That they had a hall for the sale of wool appears from
the following order : ^

*• Stratford.") Ad aulam ibm. tent. xv.° die Julii, a° regni
Burgus. J dnae Elizabethe, &c. vicesimo primo [1579] :

** At this hall it was agreed that Mr. Petoo's should be
aunswered in maner and forme followinge.
The West-hall to be proclaimed."

Registr, Burg, Stratf, A.

I am not, however, sure, that these two paragraphs are
connected with each other. Mr. Peto was a gentleman
of a very ancient family who lived at Chesterton, a few
miles from Warwick. What the subject of his letter was,
I have not been able to discover.

In February, 3 & 4 Ph. & Mar. [1556] an action on the
case was brought by William Whatley, clothier, against
Thomas Gilbert, dyer, relative to 442 yards of broad-cloth
and thirty pounds of wool and yarn, which the latter
undertook to dye for 10/. 13s. 4c?. And a similar action
was brought in July, 1589, by George Pyrrye against
Frances Wheeler, dyer, relative to a charge made by the
defendant for dying a certain quantity of woollen cloth,
which the plaintiff alleged was exorbitant.

In the inventory of William Holmes, weaver, taken at
Stratford the 22d of May, 1590, I find one piece of
medley ; " in that of Michael Shackleton, weaver, 1595,

20 ells of Hurden cloth;" and in the inventory of
Hugh Aynge, 1606, twelve pounds of woollen yarn.

At a subsequent period, however, in a petition of the
mercers and drapers of Stratford to Sir Edward Coke
about the latter end of the year 1615, praying to be
relieved from certain exactions made by Lodowick Duke
of Lenox, or persons employed by him, under colour of a
royal patent, it is stated that there were then "no clothes
or stuffs made at Stratford, but bought at London or
elsewhere : " but as I find that several of the trades
above-mentioned subsisted there at that time, 1 suspect
this statement not to be rigidly correct. The exactions
of the Duke of Lenox were made a subject of parlia-

556

APPENDIX.

mentary complaint some years before. See A Record of
some worthie Proceedings in the parliament holden in the
yeare 1611 [1610, it should have been] 4to. 1641, p. 35/'

No. XII.

Among Camden's funeral certificates is the following :

" The 7 of August, 1600.
[After mentioning the lady whom he married,] *^ Sir
Thomas Lucy departed this transitory life the 7th of July,
1600, whose funerall was worshipfully solemnized accord-
ing to his degree, at the parish of Charlecott, the 7th of
August then next following ; the preacher M"^ Hill, parson
of Hampton. The standart borne by M*^ Edward New-
port, gent. ; the penner borne by M"" William Walter ;
the helm and crest by Thomas Lant, alias Windsor, for
Chester herald ; the sword and targe borne by Nicholas
Paddie, alias Lancaster herald ; the cote of armes borne
by William Camden Esq''*' alias Clarentcieux ; the body
borne by vi of his servants. The chief mourner Thomas
Lucy Knight, sonne and heir to the defunct. The assis-
taunts Sir Richard Fynes, M"^ Jerome Farmer, and M"^
Tymothie Lucy, Esquiers. In witness of the truth the
executor hath hereunto subscribed his name the daye and
yeare above-mentioned. Tho. Lucy."

There is no will of Sir Thomas Lucy the elder in the
Prerogative Office ; but that he made one, appears from
the concluding words of this certificate. It was probably
proved at Stratford.

Sir Thomas Lucy had a sister, Joan, married to George
Verney, Esq. and a daughter, Anne, married to Sir Ed-
ward Aston, of Tickshall, in the county of Stafford.
Neither of these are mentioned by Dugdale in the pedi-
gree of the Lucy family.

His son, Sir Thomas, who, according to the inquisition
above quoted, was born in 1557 or 1558, was knighted in
1592. His first wife, who is not noticed by Dugdale>
was Dorothy, the daughter of Rowland Arnold of Glou-

APPENDIX.

557

cestershire, Esq. His second, Constantia, the daughter
of Richard Kingsmill, surveyor of the Court of Wards,
whom he appears to have married in 1594 [Esc.4Jac.
p. 2, n. 75]. From his will, which is in the Prerogative
Office (Heyes, qu. 77), and was made shortly after his
father's death (Aug. 13, 1600), it is probable that he had
travelled into foreign parts, for he bequeaths to his eldest
son (beside " all his household stuff at Sutton, the gilt
bason and ewer graven which was his father's together
with two girdles engraved, livery pots, a nest of gilded
boles with a cover, a gilded saulte and a dozen of gilded
spoones"), all his French and Italian Books'' To each of
his unmarried daughters he gives one hundred marks to
be made eyther in a chayne, carkanett, or jewell, as they
or their nearest friends shall think meete." And he re-
cites that he had made leases to certain good friends for
the payment of his debts, and for the preferment of his
natural daughters. He died July 16, 1605, and was bu-
ried at Charlecote (as appears from the registers), on the
20th of the same month. At his death, his eldest son. Sir
Thomas Lucy (for he also was then a knight), was " nine-
teen years and fifty weeks old." Esc. ut supra.

No. XIII.

Pat. 11 Hen. 8, p. l,m.9. Pro WilielmoCompton,milite.

Rex omnibus ad quos, &c. salutem. Cum dilectus
et fidelis serviens noster Willielmus Compton miles,
quandam parcellam terre, bosci et pasture in Over-
compton et Nethercompton, alias Compton Vyneyatys in
comitatu Warr. ad presens fossis sepibus et palis inclusit,
ea intencione ad inde parcum cum licencia nostra regia
faciendum, Nos de gratia nostra speciali ac ex certa
scientia et mero motu nostris concessimus ac per pre-
sentes concedimus dicto Willielmo Compton quod idem
Willielmus Compton gaudeat et teneat sibi et heredibus
et assignatis suis predictam parcellam terre pasture et
bosci sic ut premittitur inclusam, ut unum parcum, ac cum

558

APPENDIX.

omnibus et singulis libertatibus et liberis consuetudinibus
ad parcum et libertatem arci pertinentibus sive spec-
tantibus. Et ulterius de uberiori gratia nostra speciali,
ac ex certa scientia et mero motu nostris, concessimus et
licentiam dedimus eidem Wilielmo Compton heredibus
et assignatis suis pro nobis et heredibus nostris quan-
tum in nobis est, quod ipse heredes et assignate sui
et eorum quilibet predictam parcellam terre et bosci ad
presens inclusam ac duo mille acre terre et bosci suorum
cum pertinentibus in predicte ville de Overcompton
et Nethercompton, alias Compton Vynegatys in pre-
dicto comitatu Warr., simul cum predicta parcella ad
presens inclusa, aut separatim per se imparcere includere
et parcum aut parcos inde aut de qualibet inde parcella de
tempore in tempus facere possit et valeat, possint et va-
leant, et terras et boscos illos sic inclusos et parcum aut
parcos inde factos habere et tenere possit ac habeat et
teneat, possint et habeant et teneant sibi heredibus et as-
signatis suis in perpetuum, una cum omnibus libertatibus
privilegiis et liberis consuetudinibus quibuscumque ad
parcum et ad libertatem parci pertinentibus sive spectanti-
bus. Absque perturbacione impeticione impedimento mo-
lestatione seu gravamine nostri heredum vel successorum
nostrorum seu aliquorum forestariorum aut Justiciariorum
officiariorum, aut ministrorum nostrorum aut aliorum
quorumcumque. Dumtamen terre et bosci predicti non
sint infra metas sive bundas alicujus foreste sive chacee
nostre ; et hoc absque persecucione de breve de ad quod
dampnum sive aliquo alio brevi inde fiendo. Et volumus
et concedimus pro nobis heredibus et successoribus nostris
dicto Willielmo Compton heredibus et assignatis suis,
quod postquam idem Willielmus Compton heredis vel
assignati sui predicte parcelle terre ad presens incluse ac
de et in predictis duobus millibus acris terre et bosci et
in qualibet inde parcella parcum inde aut de aliqua inde
parcella fuit aut fieri fecerit quod ex tunc idem Willielmus
heredis et assignati sui habeant teneant gaudeant et
utentur infra parcum ilium sive parcos illos sic inclusos

APPENDIX.

559

omnia et singula libertatis franchisias privilegia et liberas
consuetudines ac omne id quod ad libertatem parci per-
tineant spectant et incumbant. Volentes firmiterque man-
dantes quod nuUus in parco illo ad presens incluso nec in
aliqua inde parcella terre et bosci predictorum postquam
inclusum et factum fuerit sine licentia et voluntate dicti
Willielmi Compton heredum aut assignatorum suorum in
parco illo aut parcis illis aliquas feras fugat aut capiat
vel aliquod ibidem capere aut facere presumat sive inter-
mittat quod est vel erit contra libertatem aut privilegium
parci aut contra formam aliquorum sive quorumcumque
actuum sive ordinacionem de parcis et venatoribus in
parcis concernentium editorum, et provicisorum sub pena
forisfacture quadraginta librarum et sub pena imprisona-
mente et punicionis in eisdem actibus et ordinacionibus et
eorum quolibet specificata et contenta. Et ulterius da-
mus et licentiam concedimus pro nobis heredibus et suc-
cessoribus nostris eidem Wilielmo quod ipse heredes et
assignati sui habeant et teneant sibi heredibus et assig-
natis suis liberam Warrennam in omnibus predictis duobus
minibus acris terre et in qualibet inde parcella nec non in
omnibus dominicis terris suis in vellis predictis, cum om-
nibus quse ad liberam Warrennam pertinent absque in-
peticione molestacione impedimento seu gravamine nostri
heredum seu successorum nostrorum seu aliquorum offi-
ciariorum vel ministrorum nostrorum heredum vel suc-
cessorum nostrorum aut aliorum quorumcumque ; Ita quod
nullus intret in Warrenam illam ad fugandum aut aliquod
ibidem faciendum sine licentia ipsius Wilielmi heredum vel
assignatorum suorum sub pena forisfacture decem librarum.
Dum tamen terre ille non sint infra metas sive bundas
alicujus foreste sive chacee sive Warrenne nostre.
12 April.

No. XIV.

Pat' 4 & 5 Phil' & Mar*, p. 8. m. 21.— Dec. 22.
Rex et Regina omnibus ad quos &c. salutem Sciatis

560

APPENDIX.

quod nos pro summa ducentarum quinquaginta quatuor
librarum et quindecim solidorum legalls monete Anglie ad
receptam Scaccnrij nostri ad manus dilecti servientis nostri
Nicholai Brigham unius numeratorum ejusdem Scaccarij ad
usum nostrum per predilectum et fidelem consiliarium nos-
trum Franciscum Englefyld militem magistrum curie war-
dorum et liberationum nostrorum premanibus bene ct fideliter
solutorum unde fatemur nos plenarie fore satisfactos et per-
solutos Eundemque Franciscum Englefyld heredes execu-
tores et administratores suos inde acquietatos et exoneratos
esse per presentes De gratia nostra speciali ac ex certa
scientia et mero motu nostris Dedimus et concessimus ac
per presentes pro nobis heredibus et successoribus nostrum
prefate Regine » Damns et concedimus prefato Francisco
Englefyld (inter alia) Totum ilium parcum nfm voc
Fulbroke Pke modo disparcatam ac libtatem pci nri de
Fulbroke Ac omes illas ?ras nras vocat seu cognit p nomen
vel p noia de Fulbroke Pke in Fulbroke cum ptin in com
nro Warr quondam pcella ?ra^ possessions & hereditamento^
olim ducis Bedd h dudum Jotiis nup ducis Nortliumbr de
aha pdicoe attinc^ & convict existen aut eo^ al?ius Aceciam
omes illas viginti 8c unam acras ¥re he prati nras unde una
acra jacent infra bund dci dispcati parci & viginti acras inde
adjacent extra & ppe bund ejusdem dispcati parci quond
pcett ?rap possessionu & hereditamentoJj dci quondam ducis
Bedd & dudum pceft ?ra^ possessionii 8c hereditamento^ dci
nup ducis Northumbr aut eo^ alt'ius Aceciam oines illas
octoginta acras ?re 8c pasture nras cum ptin jacen infra bund
dci nup dispcati parci ac nup pcett ?ra^ possessionu &
hereditamento^ dci quondam ducis Bedd & dudum ^dci nup
ducis Northumbr existen aut eo^ al?ius Necnon omes illas
quadraginta ^ acras ?re bruef 8c vast nras unde quadraginta
acre includun? in duab} clausuf Sre eidem nup parco ad-
jacen 8c trescent & sexaginta acre inde adjaceh infra iimites
ejusdem nup parci ac nup pceft ?ra^ possessionu 8c here-

' Sic MS.

* So in the Record (should be Quadringentas.")

APPENDIX. 561

ditamento^ del quond: ducis Bedd & dci nup duels North-
umbr existen seu eo^ al?ius Aceciam totam piscariam &
libtatem piscand nram eidem parco ptinen in aqua & rivulo
<ic Avori in dco com Warr accurrent p bund 8c limites dci
nup parci quond pcett possessionu & revenconu dci quondam
ducis Bedd & dudum pceft possessionil & revenconu dci
nup ducis Northumbf existen seu eo^ al?ius Quiquidem
parens de Fulbroke modo dispeat ac ce?a pmiss in eodem
parco & ppe eundem ^arcum jaeen modo sunt in possessione
dci Francisci Englefelde seu tenenciu vel assign suo^.

No. XV.

This letter was written, in the year 1598, to Mr. Quiney,
when he was in London, engaged in the business of the
borough of Stratford. It is as follows :

Quam possum brevissime ; sed quam amantissime,
nee possum Uteris exprimere neque mente concipere
quidem. Multifarias tuas ante et post Nativitatem epis-
tolas accepi : etiam magistro Wendaio datas et Westo
ejus clerico Cantabrigiae vidi, et magna voluptate animi
perlegi ad Sessiones pacis. Sed quomodo ad te rescribe-
rem propter itinerationis tuse incertitudinem, facile con-
jectari non potui. Per quas ad nos proxime dedisti et
Magistro Wendaio scripsisti, opinor te Londinum per-
ventum se [esse] et illic te hiis meis obviam dare et de
rebus omnibus iis, quantum memoriae dabitur recordari,
sic habeto. Tui tuseque omnes bene valent. Res tuae
domesticae patris cura, conjugis industria, ancillarum
labore, benedicente Domino, succedunt pene ad votum.
Leo. Ben.^ [Leonard Bennet] mutuo dedit 50*^ libras stipu-
latore Joh. Sadlero tantum. M"" Th. Brbr [Barber] nec
ego uUas. M"^ Ballivus, Aldermannus, et consociatio
nostra omnis valet. Robertus Bedell deest; et org
[George] Badger dissociatus (uti accepi) ad Came-
rariorum computationem, agente me ipso Bedfordiae et
Cantabrigiae. Quibus locis quid a me actum sit, cum
domum veneris (si interim non illic) accipies. Canta-
VOL. II. 2 O

562

APPENDIX .

brigiae dies solum datus est ; Bedfordiae partim ad manus
venerunt, partim in expectatione pendent. Quae in illis
comitatibus vel expectationibus vel optionibus nostris
responderunt, eorum omnium laudes magistro nostro
Burgoino debentur meritissime secundum Deum. Jam
tuo peregrinationis socio me commendatum habe ; cujus
uxor ac familia valetudine fruuntur desiderata, rebus
aliquanto arctioribus et pressioribus. Utcumque bene sit
vobis in negotiis vestris, valde imo pervaide desiderati
estis. Quare omni jam excusatione cessante, domum
celeriter advolate. Johannis Rogerus promisit se omni
rationi promptum et alacrem, sed nihil adhuc prestitum
est. Cognatus dominus Combe vasa argentea et aureata
pro vado tenet, ex suasione et deliberatione Danielis
Baker quo cum etiam valde succensebat tua gratia, sed
illius concitationis et iracundiae ilium poenituisse puto :
sed quidem ignoro an in gratiam rediit adhuc. Sed ne
verbum unum addam amplius. Sed incolumem te servet
Deus omnipotens ut te sospitem mittet ad nos omni festi-
nationi festinantius. Quia jam ad me venit soror ut
litteras ad te exarem, suo nomine, illius igitur et nostri
reliqua habebis vernaculo sermone ; haec enim hebetiora.
Stretfordiae Januarii 18 vpe [vespere] dat.*"' 1597 [1597-8].
" Tuus utcunque suus
Abrah. Sturley.

" Si otium dabitur, siste lites inter Magistrum Clopton
et me, ac etiam inter Dominum Burtonum. Metuo non
sine multo timore a mgra [magistra] warda.

" To his most lovinge Brother, M"^ Richard Quiney att
London geve these."

Mr. Abraham Sturley was, in 1590, married to the
daughter of Mr. Richard Hill ; as appears from Mr. Hill's
will. Richard Quiney married Elizabeth Philips
(Jan. 24, 1580-1); but she having died, he married
Susanna, the sister of Abraham Sturley, as I learn from
one of her letters to her husband, written by her brother
Sturley, whose love of intermixing Latin in his letters

APPENDIX.

563

was so great that he could not refrain from this practice,
even while he was holding the pen for his sister ; for he
thus concludes the letter to which I allude :

" Your kind &c loving wife bj u*"

most loving broth'r hir secretary
in hac litterd, hac vice tantu,
" Susa. Qui."

The Mr. Comb mentioned in the foregoing Latin letter
was, without doubt, Mr. John Combe. Mr. George
Badger was a woollen-draper in Stratford.

In a letter, dated at Stratford, Oct. 27, 1598, and
directed thus : " To his most loving brother M' Richard
Quiney att the bell in Carter Lane give these with speed,"
I find the following passages :

*^ M"^ Baily is coming unto youe. he saith he will bring
u [you] up the rest of the tax money, he will joyne with
you if he can tarri ; but if he hast downe againe, and
that ani liklihood of [y^^i"] proceeding mai appe
[appere] it i« ordered that I shall come unto youe with
speede. for u'" [your] ease and comfort. Quid mihi opta-
tius, quid gratius mihi accidere potest in hoc communi
bono tibi conjungi, cui sim conjunctissimus ? Hse chartae
nimis suntcurtse hsec nox non satis erit describendis hiis.
nullus intervenerit nuntius, sine litteris ^ostris aliquid de
hiis rebus prae se ferentibus. Brother Q. when u se it
past padventure in your judgment, stand upon hit how u
shall be considered ; although in mine opinion you need
not : quoniam, uti spero, melior pars major. Nunc de
tuis sic habe. U"^ father, and w. ch. [wife and children]
well, and houshold not want but of u ; which is well for-
borne whilest u are so well employed. U"" father hath
sent u the particulars of so much as my sister will willingly
passe : for W"" W. house, she hath destined hit for
hir daughter Pli. [Plymley] which she will not alter
as yet."

^ o 2

564

APPENDIX.

In many other of his letters to Mr. Quiney, sentences
of Latin are occasionally intermixed.

No. XVI.

" Patri suo amantissimo Mro.Richardo Quinye Richardus
Quinye filius S. P. D.

" Ego omni officio ac potius pietate erga te (mi pater)
tibi gratias ago pro lis omnibus beneficiis quae in me
contulisti; te etiam oro et obsecro ut provideres fratri
meo et mihi duos chartaceos libellos quibus maxime caremus
hoc presenti tempore ; si enim eos haberemus, plurimus
profecto iis usus esset nobis : et prseterea gratias tibi ago
quia a teneris, quod aiunt, unguiculis, educasti me in
sacrse doctrinse studiis usque ad hunc diem. Absit
etiam verbulis meis vana adulationis suspicio, neque
enim quenquam ex meis amicis cariorem aut aman-
tiorem mei te esse judico; et vehementer obsecro ut
maneat semper egregius iste amor tuus sicut semper
anteahac; et quanquam ego non possum remunerare tua
beneficia, omnem tamen ab intimis meis prsecordiis tibi
exoptabo salutem. Vale.

" Filiolus tuus tibi obedientissimus,

" Richardus Quinye."
There is no date to this letter ; but it was probably
written either in the latter end of the year 1597 or in 1598,
in each of which years the elder Mr. Richard Quiney was
in London, soliciting a renewal and enlargement of the
charter, and an exemption for the borough of Stratford
from a subsidy granted by parliament. The writer,
Richard Quiney, was his second son, and was baptized at
Stratford, Oct. 8, 1587 : he was, therefore, at the time of
writing this letter, either ten or eleven years old. Can
there be a doubt that such a youth as Shakspeare, who
was bred in the same school, could have written such a
letter in 1575, when he was of the same age.

APPENDIX.

No. XVII.

{Complete Copy of the Verses on Sir Thomas Lu

A parliement member, a justice of peace.
At home a poore scarecrowe, in London an asse,
If Lucy is Lowsie as some volke misscall it
Synge Lowsie Lucy whatever befall it.

He thinks hymself greate, yet an asse in hys state
We allowe bye his eares but with asses to mate ;
If Lucy is Lowsie as some volke misscall it,
Synge Lowsie Lusy whatever befall it.

He's a haughty proud insolent knighte of the shire
At home nobodye loves, yet theres many hym feare.
If Lucy is Lowsie as some volke misscall it
Synge Lowsie Lucy whatever befall it.

To the sessions he went and dyd sorely complain
His parke had been rob'd and his deer they were slain
This Lucy is Lowsie as some volke misscall it
Synge Lowsie Lucy whatever befall it.

He sayd twas a ryot his men had been beat.
His venson was stole and clandestinely eat.
Soe Lucy is Lowsie as some volke misscall it
Synge Lowsie Lucy whatever befall it.

Soe haughty was he when the fact was confess'd
He sayd 'twas a crime that could not bee redress'd,
Soe Lucy is Lowsie as some volke misscall it
Synge Lowsie Lucy whatever befall it.

Though Lucies a dozen he paints in his coat
His name it shall Lowsie for Lucy bee wrote
For Lucy is Lowsie as some volke misscall it
Synge Lowsie Lucy whatever befall it.

If a iuvenile frolick he cannot forgive
We'll synge Lowsie Lucy as long as we live
And Lucy the Lowsie a libel may call it
We'll synge Lowsie Lucy whatever befall it.

566

APPENDIX.

No. XVIII.

Most lovinge and beloved in the L*^. in plaine englishe
we remembr u in the L"* & o^ selves unto you. I vs^ould
write nothinge unto u no we — but come home. I praj G"*
send u comfortabli home. This is one speciall remem-
brance, from u"^ fathrs motion. It seemeth bi him that
o^ countriman Mr. Shakspe is willing to disburse
some monej upon some od yardeland or other att Shottrj
or neare about us. he thinketh it a very fitt patterne to
move him to deale in the matter of o"" Tithes. Bj the
instructions u can geve him theareof, & bj the frendes he
can make therefore, we thinke it a faire marke for him to
shoote at, & not unpossible to hitt. It obteined would
advance him in deede, & would do us much o'ood. hoc
movere & quantum in te e pmovere, ne negligas : hoc
enim et sibi et nobis maximi erit momenti : hie labor,
hoc opus esset eximiae et glorise et laudis sibi.

u shall understande, brother, that o*". neighbours are
grone with the wantes they feele throughe the dearnes
of corne, (w^. heare is bejonde all other countries that I
can heare of deare & over deare), malecontent. They
have assembled togeath'r in a great nomb's, & travelled
to S' Tho. Lucy on ffriday last, to complaine of o"" malst'rs :
on Sunday to ffoulke Gre. [Grevill] & S'" Joh. Conway.
I should have said on Wensday to S' Ed. Grevll first
theare is a metinge heare expected to-morrowe : the L'*
knoweth to what end it will sorte. Tho. West returning
from the ij knights of the woodland % came home so full,
that he said to M^ Baily that night, he hoped w'hin a
week to leade of the in a halter, meaninge the malst'rs ;
& I hope, saith Tho. Granams, if G"^ send mj of Essex
downe shortlj, to se the hanged on gibbets at their owne
doores.

To this end I write this chieflj : That as u"^ occasion
shall suffer u to staj theare, thearein gett by Ed.

- Sir F. Greville, and Sir John Conway.

APPENDIX.

567

Grev. some meanes made to the Knights of the pliam't
for an ease & discharge of such taxes 8c subsedies where
w'' o"^ towne is like to be charged, & I assm'e u I am in
great feare & doubt bj no meanes hable to paje. S"^ Ed.
Gre. is gonne to Brestowe, & from thence to Lond. as I
heare, who verie well knoweth o"^ estates, & wilbe willinge
to do us anj good.

o"^ great bell is broken, & W™. Wiatt is mendinge the
pavem'te of the bridge.

mj sister is chearefull & the hath bin mercifull &
comfortable to us & hir in hir labours, & so u be well
imploied, geveth u leave to followe u^ occasions for 1
weeke or fortnight longer. I would u weare furnisht to
paj W"' Pattrike for me xU. & bringe his qittance, for I
thinke his specialtie is in Tho Knight hand, due at
Candles daie. Yesterday I spake to Mr. Sheldon at S*'
Tho. Lucies, for the staie of Mr. Burtons suite, & that
the cause might be referred to M^ Walk'rs of Ellington ;
he answered me, y^ M' Bur. was nowe att Lond. & w^^
all his harte & good will the suite should be staled, &
the matter so referred. I have here inclosed a breife of
the reckoninge betwene him & me, as I would have it
passe, & as in a'qitie it should passe, if he wilbe but as
good as his faith & ^mise.

Good brother, speake to M"^ Goodale, that there be no
more Jceadinge in tharches bj M"^ Clopton, whom I am
content & most willing to compounde w^'^all, & have
bin ever since the beginninge of the laste terme, and
thearefore much iniured bj some bodie y* I have bin
put to an unnecessarie charge of xxs. & upwards, that
terme ; wheareas I had satisfied M"^ Clopton, as I was
crediblj made believe by some of his s'rvantes. I was
allso assured of the staie of suite bj M"^ Barnes in the
harvest, & bj M"" Pendleburj the latter end of the terme.
mj hroth'r Woodward cometh up att the latter end of this
week, who will speake to Mr. Clopton him selfe to that
purpose.

568

APPENDIX.

u understande bj mj le'r I sent bj countrinia,
Bur'll, that masse Brentt dispatchd 50/. for u. Jh. Sdlr,
[John Sadler] bounde alone as yeat. Because Mr. Brbr
[Barber] might not have it for 12 moneths, he would none
at all, wherebj I loste my expectation, & [am] leafte I
assure u in the greatest neede of 30/. that possiblj male
be. In truth, brother, to u be it spoke 8c to none els ; for
want thereof knowe skarce w'^ waj to turne me.

Det deus misericordise dcus [Query, dons, i. e. dominus]
exitu secundu bene placitum suum.

u' father w^'\ his blessinge & comendation mj sister
^th. j^gj. lovinge remembrance, comends her: in health
booth, with all u'' childre 8c houshold. u*^ father extraor-
dinarj hartie, chearefull, 8c lustie, hath sent u this remem-
brance inclosed.

It maie be u knowe Hins [him] his execut'r 8c brother ;
I meane of whom o"" brof Whte borowed for me the
80/. paihable at maj next, his name I have not att hand,
he dwelleth in Watlinge Streate, if 40/. thereof might be
p'cured for 6 monethes more, it would make me whole.
I knowe it doeth u good to be doing good 8c y*^ u will do
all the good u can.

I would Hamlet ^ weare at home satisfied for his paines
take before his coming 8c so freed from further travell.

Nunc deus omnipot'ns opt. max. pater omnimodae
consolationis benedicat tibi in viis tuis, et secundet
te in omb. tuis p Ihn. crm. dom. erm. Du. ullus su
tuis tu. Abrah. Strl. [Sturley.]

Stratfordia Januarii 24 [1597-8].

Comend me to Mr Tom. Bur'll 8c praj him ffor me 8c
my broth. Da. Bakr [Daniel Baker] to looke y*T. Tub maie
be well hooped, that he leake not out lawe to o"^ hurte, for
his cause : q5d partem avidio nonnihil suspicor 8c timeo.

3 Hamnet or Hamlet Sadler, who was probably godfather to
Shakspeare's only son. He had accompanied Mr. Richard
Quiney to London, on the business of the borough of Stratford.

APPENDIX. 569

Received of Mr. But : /. s. d.

Beanes 23q^ att 3s. 4d. the strike 30 13 4

Burley, 8q^^ & 4str. at 4s. str 13 12 0

Wheate 4q''. 4 str. att 6s. St/, y" str 12 0 0

56 5 4

I have paid & sowed theareof, 52/. lis. Sd,

Mj lad. Gre. is ru [run] in arreages w^^ mj sister for

malt (as it seemeth), w'' hendreth & troubleth hir not a

littel.

No. XIX.

Nov. 4. 1598. All health happines of suites and w^ell-
fare be multiplied unto u & u^ labours in o'. fFather by
C7. o>- L**.

V Per of the 21 of octobr came to mj handes the laste

of the same at night ^ Grenwai, w^. imported a staj of
suites bj S^'E^. G^ [Edward GrevilFs] advise, until &c^
& y* only u should follow on for tax & sub. ^ntly and
allso u"". travell & hinderance of answere therein, bj u"^*
longe travell & thaffaires of the Courte : And that o^
countrima M"^ W. Shak. [Shakspeare] would p'cure us
monej, w^. I will like of, as I shall heare when, & wheare,
& howe ; and I praj let not go that occasion, if it maj
sorte to anj indifferent condicions. Also y* if monej
might be had for 30 or 40^ a lease, &c. might be p'rocured
Oh howe can you make dowbt of monej, who will not
beare xxx^^^ or xP. towards such a match ! The latter end
of u"^ Ter w*= concerned u"" houshold affaires I dd [delivered]
J'ntly : nowe to u"^ other Ter of the P. of novmber received
the 3*^ of the same.

* The borough of Stratford at this time were soliciting the
Lord Treasurer Burghley to be exempted from the subsidies im-
posed in the last Parliament, on the plea of poverty and distress
occasioned by two recent fires.

570

APPENDIX.

I would I weare with u ; naj if you continue with hope
of those suites u wrghte of, I thinke I shall w* [without]
concent ; & I will most willinglj come unto u ; as had
u but advise & companj & more monej J'nte [present]
much might be done to obtaine o'" Ccr [charter] enlarged,
ij faires more, with tole of corne bests and sheepe and a
matter of more valeu the [than] all that ; for (say u) all
this is nothing y* is in hand, seeinge it will not rise to 80'.
8c the charges wilbe greate. What this matter of more
valeu meaneth I cannot undrstand ; but me thinketh what-
soever the good would be, u are afraid of want of monej.
Good things in hand or neare hand can not choose but be
worth monei to bring to hand, and being assured, will if
neede be, bringe monej in their mouthes ; there is no feare
nor dowbte. If it be the rest of the tithes 8c the College
houses and lands in o"^ towne u speake of, the one half
weare abundantly ritch for us ; and the other halfe to
increase S'^ [Grevill's] rialties would both beare the
charge 8c set him sure on : the w*" I take to be your mean-
inge bj the latter p'te of u'^ I'er, where u write for a copie
of the ^'ticulars (w^. allso u shall have accordingly) Oh
howe I fear whe I se what S"^ E"^ can do, 8c howe neare it
sitteth to his selfe : leaste he shall thinke it to [too] good
for us, 8c p'cure it for himselfe, as he s'ved us the last time,
for it seemeth by u*^ owne words theare is some of hit [it]
in u"" owne conceite, when u write if S*" E"^ be as forward to
do as to speake, it will be done : a dowbt I assure you not
w'hout doubt to be made : — whearto allso u ad not-
w^standing y^ doubt, no want but monej. Somewhat must
be to S"^ E^ 8c to each one y* dealeth somewhat 8c great
reason. And me thinketh u need not be afFraid to p'mise
that as fitt for him, for all the [them] and for u"^ selfe.
The thinge obtained no dowbte will paj all. For ^'sent ad-
vice and encouragmte u have by this time Bailj ; and for
monej, when you certifie what u have done, 8c what u have
spent, what u will do, 8c what u wante, somewhat u knowe

APPENDIX.

571

we have in hand, & G'^ will p' vide that w*^ shall be sufficient.
Be of good courage. Make fast S"^ E'*. bj all meanes, or
els all our hope & u"" travells be utterlj disgraced Consider
and advise if S'' Ed. will be faste for us, so y* bj his good-
will to us & his meanes for us these things be brought
about. What weare it for the fee farme of his rialties,
nowe not above xii or xiij^ he weare assured of the double,
when these things come to hand, or more, as the good-
nes of the things pr'cured p'veth. But whj do I travill in
these things, whe [when] I knowe not certainly what u
intende, neither what u'" meanes are, nor what are u"^ diffi-
culties p'ciselj & by name all w^ must be knowe' by name
& speciallj w^'' an estimate of the charge before anj thing
can be added either for advise or supplie. I leave these
matters therefore unto the allmighties mercifull disposition
in u"" hand untill a more neare possibilite or more leisure
will encourage u or suffer u to write more plainly & p'ti-
cularly. Butw*hall the Chancell must not be forgotte'
w ^ allso obtained would yeald somep'ettj gub of monej
for u'^ p'sent busines as I thinke. The p'ticuiars u write
for shalle this morninge be dispatched & sent as soon as
maj be. — All is well att home ; all your paiments made &
dispatchd, mj sister saith if it be so y* u can not be
pVided for M"^^ Pendllbur. [Pendlebury] she will, if you
will, send you up towards that by the next after, or if
u take it up paj it to who u appointe. W"^ Wallford
sendeth order and monej p W*" Court nowe cominge
who hath some cause to feare, for he was newelj s'ved w^''
p'ces [process] on Tusday last at Ale^ [Aleeber] J Rog'r
S[adler].

M"^ Parsons supposeth that Wenlock came the same day
^th ]y[r Bailj yt u writt u'' I'er. he saith he supposeth u maj
use yt x^ for our br'winge matters. W"™ Wiatt answered
M' Ba [Bailif] and us all y^ he would neither b'rwe him
selfe, nor submit him selfe to the order ; but (bj those very
wordes) make against it w^*' all the strength he could

572

APPENDIX.

possibly make, yeat we do this day begin IVP Bar[ber] and
my selfe a littel for assai. My bro. D. B. [Daniel Baker]
att Shrewsburj or homeward from thence. But nowe the
bell hath runge my time spent. The L*^ of all power,
glorj, mercj, grace and goodnes, make his great power &
mercie knowe towardes us in u'' weaknes Take heed of
tabacco whereof we heare ^ W"™ Perrj against ani longe
iournei u maj undertake on foote of necessity, or wherein
the exercise of bodj must be implored, drinke some
good burned wine or aq'avita and ale strongly mingled
w*^out bread for a t[oast] & above all keepe u warme.
Farewell mj dare heart, and the L"* increase o^ loves &
comforts one to an other that once it maj be such as be-
comethe Christianity purity & sincerity w**^out staine or
blemishe. Fare you well, all u' & o" well, ffrom Strat-
ford, Novem. 4*^1598.

u'^^ in all love in the best bond

Abrah. Sturley.

M" Coomb5 whe"Girert Charnocke paid the there
monej as he told me, said y* if anj but he had brought it
she would not receve it, because she had not hir gowne ;
& that she would arrest u for hit as soon as u come home;
& much twattle ; but at the end so y^ youe would pai 4".
towards hit, she would allow u xx' & we shall heare at
some leasure howe fruits are & hopps & sutch knakks.
At this point came W"™ Sheldon the silkma with a war-
rant to serve W"" Walford againe upon a trespasse of 500/.

To his most lovinge brother M"" Richard Quiney, at the
Bell in Carter Lane att London, give these.

No. XX.

Sir Walter Ralegh, at the time Colin Clout was written,

5 Probably Mrs. Mary Combe, the wife of Thomas Combe^
John Combe's elder brother.

APPENDIX.

573

was forty years old. His acquaintance with Spenser, we
may presume, commenced in Ireland, where he first distin-
guished himself in military service, during the years 1580
and 1581 ; Spenser being, at that time, secretary to Arthur
Lord Grey, who assumed the government of Ireland, as
Lord Deputy, in September, 1580. At the assault on the
Golden Fort, near Dingle, in the county of Kerry, a few
days after Grey's arrival, where the inhuman office of
putting the garrison to the sword, in cold blood, after
they had surrendered at discretion, was assigned to
Ralegh and another officer ; Spenser, as he has himself
told us, was near the scene of action, in the train of the
Lord Deputy ; for whose conduct, on that occasion, he
has made an elaborate defence. In 1582, Ralegh re-
turned to England; and after the death of Gerald, the
sixteenth Earl of Desmond, and the consequent confis-
cation of his immense estate, consisting of near
600,000 acres, which produced a revenue of about
7000/. per annum, Ralegh's services were rewarded,
in 1585, with a grant of 12,000 acres of land, in the
counties of Waterford and Cork. " He had these lands,"
according to a manuscript in the Lambeth Library
(No. 617), *^ by expresse words of warranty in a special
letter from her Majestic at a hundred marks pann. rent."
Till the year 1 590, however, neither he, nor any other of
the undertakers, as they were called, paid any rent.
From Michaelmas, 1591, to Michaelmas, 1594, he paid
only fifty marks a-year ; and from that time, for ever,
his rent was fixed at one hundred marks annually.
In 1587, as appears from a letter written by himself to
Sir Robert Cecil (Burghley Papers, p. 658), he built a
castle on this estate, and established on it a colony
brought from England ; but before May, 1593, he had
been " driven to recall all his people." And, about the
year 1600, he sold this estate to Richard Boyle, after-
wards the great Earl of Corke, who, by means of its
woods, and the iron-works which he erected on it, made

574

APPENDIX.

a great accession to his fortune. In the summer of 1589,
as has been stated in the text, having been chased from the
court, by Essex, he repaired to his estate in Ireland, and,
doubtless, then spent some time with Spenser, at his
Castle of Kilcolman, which was not far distant from
Ralegh's estate : and the poet appears to have afterwards
accompanied his friend to England.

Dr. Birch, in his Life of Ralegh, and others after him,
have stated that Ralegh obtained, of the crown, a
grant, in 1594, of some church lands ; a course of reward
usual, with Queen Elizabeth, towards such as had per-
formed any considerable service to the state . . . .Dr. John
Caldwell, upon his election to the see of Salisbury,
having consented to alienate the manor of Sherborne in
Dorsetshire, Sir Walter requested and procured it from
her Majesty." This statement is wholly inconsistent with
the history of his disgrace at court ; for it cannot be sup-
posed that the Queen would grant him any favour at the
very time he was forbid to appear in her presence. To
avoid that inconsistency, therefore, it has been supposed
that, in 1594, he was restored to her Majesty's favour,
which he had lost by seducing one of her maids of
honour, Elizabeth, a daughter of Sir Nicholas Throck-
morton. But the truth is, that Dr. Caldwell, after he
was elected to the see of Salisbury, and before he was
confirmed in the bishoprick, on the 18th of January,
1590-91, made a lease of the manor of Sherborne to the
Queen, for ninety-nine years, at the annual rent of
200/. \Qs. \d, ^ ; and, nine days afterwards, the Queen as-
signed it over to Ralegh, for the remainder of her term.
His disgrace took place near eighteen months afterwards,
July 1592, when he was, for some time, committed to
the custody of Sir George Carew, Lieutenant-General of
the Ordnance ; and on the 31st of July, he wascommit-

6 Glaus. 34 Eliz. p. 13.

APPENDIX.

676

ted to the Tower, where he was confined for two months.
See a letter, from Sir Edward Stafford, to Anthony-
Bacon, July 30, 1592, Birch's Memoirs of Elizabeth,
part i. p. 79. From other letters in the same collection, and
from Camden, we learn, that he was not admitted into
the Queen's presence before the end of the year 1595 ; if
even then. In the summer of 1596, he was so far for-
given, as to be allowed a command in the expedition
against Cadiz ; but he was not allowed to resume the exer-
cise of his office of Captain of the Guard till 1597. The
disgrace, therefore, which Spenser so pathetically laments,
continued for nearly five years. About two years after
his restoration to the Queen's favour, and while his rival,
Essex, was absent from the court, September 11, 1599,
he obtained, from her, a grant of the manor of Sherborne
to him and his heirs for ever 7, of which he had before
only a lease. At what time his marriage with Elizabeth
Throckmorton took place, has not been ascertained. It
appears that she accompanied him to the Tower, in July,
1592; but a letter written by him to Cecil, and dated
March 10, 1592 ^ about three months before he and that
lady were confined (for Ralegh reckoned the year as we
now do), contains these remarkable words : " I meane
not to come away, as they say, I will, for feare of a mar-
riage, and I know not what. If any such thing weare, I
would have imparted it unto your sealf, before any man
living ; and therefore I pray, believe it not ; and I be-
seech you to suppress what you can, any such malicious
report; for I protest before God, there is none on the face
of the yearth, that I would be fastned unto''

During the period above-mentioned, it was, that he
poured forth those piteous complaints at being excluded
from the presence of his love's Queen, and the goddess
of his life ; " to which Spenser alludes in the following
verses of the poem which has given rise to these observa-

7 Pat. 4.1 EUz. p. 12.

8 Murden, p. 663.

576

APPENDIX.

tions. Thestylis having asked what was the subject on
which the shepheard of the ocean descanted, Colin
replies,

** His song was all a lamentable lay,

" Of great unkindness and of usage hard,

" Of Cynthia, the ladie of the sea,

*' Which from her presence faultlesse him debarr'd.

And ever and anon with singulis rife,
" He cryed out, to make his under song,
" Ah my love's queene, and goddesse of my life^
*' Who shall me pitie, when thou dost me wrong."

That the colouring of this picture is not overcharged^
appears from Ralegh's own words, and also from a very
curious letter written by Arthur Gorges, and already
alluded to.

In a letter, written by Ralegh to Cecil, in July 1592,
and, as it should seem, on the day when he was sent to the
Tower, are the following passages :

My heart was never broken till this day, that I hear
the Queen goes away so farr of [on her progress], whom
I have followed so many years with so great love and
desire, in so many journeys, and am now left behind her
in a dark prison all alone. When she was at hand, that
I might hear of her once in two or three dayes, my sorrowes
were the lesse ; but even now my heart is cast into the
depth of all misery. / that was wont to behold her riding
like Alexander, hunting like Diana, walking like Venus,
the gentle wind blowing her hair about her pure cheeks, like
a nymph ; sometimes sitting in the shade like a goddess ;
sometimes singing like an angel; sometimes playing like
Orpheus; behold the sorrow of this world, once [one] amiss

hath bereaved me of all All those times past, the loves,

the sythes, the sorrows, the desires, can they not weigh
down one frail misfortune ! Cannot one drop of gall be
hidden in so great heaps of sweetness ? I may then con-
clude, spes et fortuna, valete."

APPENDIX.

577

Mr. Gorgets letter to Sir Robert Cecil, on this subject,
is so curious, and so well4ikistrates Spenser's verses, that I.
shall give it entire. Dr. Birch says, " it has no date of
month or year, but the indorsement is 26th July." The
indorsement, however, in the copy in the Museum (MSS.
Birch, 4106) is as follows : ^* Mr. A. Gorge's letter to
my Mr. July 26, 1592 ; " which doubtless was written
by Cecil's secretary. This letter was written five days
before that above quoted, while Ralegh was in the
custody of Sir George Carew (afterwards Earl of Totness),
then Lieutenant-General of the Ordnance :

Honorable Sir,
I cannot chuse but advertise you of a straunge tra-
gedye, that this day had lyke to have fallen oute betweene
the Captayne of the Guarde, and the Lyvetennant of the
Ordenaunce, if I had not by greate chaunce cummen at
the very instant to have turned it into a comedye. For
uppon the report of her Majesty es being at Sir George
Carey's 9, Sir W. Rawly having gazed and syghed a long
tyme att his study-wyndow, from whence he myght dis-
cerne the barges and boates about the Black-fryars
stayers, soodaynly he brake owte into a greate distemper,
and sware, that hys enemyes had of purpose brought hyr
majestye thether, to breake his gaiile in sounder with Tan-
talus^ torments, that, when shee went away he myght see hys
death before his eyes : with many such lyke conceyts.
And as a mann transported with passion, he sware to
Sir George Carew, that he wolde disguyse hyme selfe, and
gett into a payer of oares, to ease his mynde but with a
syght of the Queene, or els he protested his harte wolde
breake. But the trusty Jaylor wold non of that, for dis-
pleasing ' the higher powers, as he sayde, which he more
respected than the feeding of hys humor : and so flatly

9 The eldest son of Lord Hunsden.
* i. e. for fear of displeasing, &c.

VOL. II. 2 r

578

APPENDIX.

refused to permitt hym. But in conclusion, uppon the
dispute, they fell flatt owte to colloryq outragious
wordes, with streyning and struggling att the doores,
that all lamenes was forgotten, and, in the fury of the
conflyct, the jaylor he had hys newe perwygg torne of
[off] his crowne ; and yet heare the battle ended not, for
at laste they had gotten owte theyr daggers : which when
I sawe, I played the styckler betweene theme, and so
purchased such a rapp on the knockles, that I wysht both
theyr pates broken : and so with much adoo they stayed
theyre brawle, to see my bloody ed fyngers. Att the
fyrste, I was ready to breake with laughinge, to see
theme too so scamble and brawle lyke mad menn, untyll
I sawe the iron walkinge ; and then I did my best to
apease the fury. As yet I canot reconcyle them by any
perswasions, for Sir Walt, sweares, that he shall hate
hyme for so restrayning hyme from the syght of his
mistress, whylst he lyves ; for that he knowes not (as he
sayd) whether ever he shall see hyr agayne, when she is
goane the Progress. And Sir Georg on hys syde, swares,
that he had rather he should lose hys longinge, then that
hewolde draw on hym hyr Majesties displeasure by such
libertie. Thus they contynew in mallyce and snarlynge ;
but I am sure all the smarte lyghted on me. I cannot tell
wheare [whether] I should more alowe [approve] of the
passionate lover, or the trusty jaylor. But yf your selfe
had scene it as I dyd, yow wold have byne as hartely
merry and sorry as ever yow weare in all your lyfe, for so
short a tyme. I praye yow pardon my hasty wrytten
narration, which I acquaynt yow with, hoping yow will be
the peace-maker. But good sir, let no body knowe
theareof, for I feare Sir W. Rawly wyll shortely growe to
be Orlando Furioso, if the bryght Angelica persever
agaynst hyme a lyttle longer.

^' Your Honors humbly to be commanded,

^' A. Gorges.

London in haste, this Wensdaye."

APPENDIX.

579

From the following postscript, added on a slip of paper,
and fastened by wax to the letter, it appears that the
writer's principal object was, that it should be shown to
the Queen, in order to serve Ralegh, who was his kins-
man:

"If you let the Qs. Majestic know heareof, as you
thinck good, so be it ; but otherwyse, good Sir, keepe it
secrett, for theyr credyttes, for they know not of my
discourse, which I could wyshe her Majestic knewe.'^

It remains only to add a few words concerning Ralegh's
poetry. Puttenham, in 1589, says, '* for dittie and
amorous ode I finde Sir Walter Raleyglis vayne most
loftie insolent and passionate ; " and in another place he
classes him in *^ the crewe of courtly makers, noblemen
and gentlemen of her Majesties own servauntes, who
have written excellently well, as it would appeare, if their
doings could be found out and made publicke with the
rest." Of the doings of Ralegh in this way, very few
remain ; but yet more than is generally known. It is ex-
traordinary that his Cynthia, a poem written expressly in
honour of Elizabeth, should not have been preserved. It
is alluded to by Spenser, in his letter expounding the
scheme of the Faery Queen, and again more particularly
mentioned in the conclusion of his verses addressed to
Ralegh, at the end of the third book of that poem.
Gabriel Harvey, in his MSS notes on Chaucer, already
quoted, denominates Ralegh's Cynthia, *' a fine and
sweet invention." Puttenham, in p. l68, and elsewhere,
has quoted lines from some of Ralegh's ditties. The
little poem, entitled sometimes The Farewell, and some-
times The Lie, beginning — " Go, soul, the body's guest,"
which has been attributed to Ralegh, I believe, first
appeared in Davison's Poetical Rhapsody. 1608 ; but it is
not subscribed with even the initial letters of his names.
It may, therefore, be doubted whether it be his. Who-
soever was its author, it must have been written as early
as 1595, for a manuscript copy of it with that date is in

2 P 2

580

APPENDIX.

my possession. On the other hand, the poem sub-
scribed W. R., and published by Davison, in the first edi-
tion of the same miscellany, 1602, beginning with the
words — " Conceipt begotten by the eyes," and the verses
prefixed to the translation of Lucan, by his friend Sir
Arthur Gorges, folio, 1614, and subscribed with the
same initial letters, were doubtless written by Ralegh.

Among the epitaphs on Sir Philip Sidney, collected by
Spenser at the close of his Astrophel, that which com-
mences " To praise thy life or waile thy worthie death,"
was certainly Sir Walter's production, as appears from
the notes subjoined to the 16th book of Harrington's
translation of Ariosto : Our English Petrarche, Sir
Philip Sidney, or, as Sir Walter Ralegh in his Epitaph
worthely calleth him, * the Scipio and the Petrarche of
our time,' " &c. See the last stanza of the epitaph in ques-
tion. Indeed, the authors of all the anonymous epitaphs
on Sidney, subjoined to Spenser's Astrophel, may, in like
manner, be ascertained. The first epitaph, by Clorinda,
as Spenser himself intimates, was written by Mary
Countess of Pembroke. The second, entitled The Mour-
ning Muse of Thestylis, was written at Dublin, in 1587,
by Spenser's friend, Lodowick Bryskett, the initial letters
of whose names are subscribed to the following ^Eglogue,
with the same motto, which is prefixed to his Trea-
tise of Civil Life, 4to. 1606. See also an entry in the
Stationers' books, by John Wolfe, in 1587 : The Mourn-
full Muses of Lod. Bryskett upon the Death of the most
noble Sir Phillip Sidney, Knight." The third anonymous
epitaph, beginning — As then no wind at all there blew,"
was the production of Mathew Roydon, a poet who was
living in 1611 (see Davies's Scourge of Folly, p. 201), and
whose " comick inventions " are highly praised by
Nashe, in his epistle prefixed to Greene's Menaphon, 4to.
1589, ad Jinem, where there is a reference to this elegy.
The fourth, we have seen, is Sir Walter Ralegh's ; and the
fifth, beginning, " Silence augmenteth grief, writing en-

APPENDIX.

581

creaseth rage," may be safely attributed to Sir Edward
Dyer. It had previously appeared in a miscellany enti-
tled The Phoenix Nest, 4to. 1593, where it is said to be
excellently written by a most worthy gentleman." He
was an intimate friend of Sidney ; and these verses were
evidently dictated by sincere grief and affection. The
measure, too, is that which Dyer has employed in other
compositions

* As Httle of Dyer's poetry is generally known, I have annexed
the following not unfavourable specimen transcribed by Mr.
Malone from Rawiinson's MSS. in the Bodleian, compared with
another copy in the Ashmolean Museum : :

*' He that his mirth hath lost whose comforte is dismayde,
** Whose hope is vayne, whose fayth is scornde, whose trust is
all betrayde,

'* If he have held them deere, and cannot cease to moane,
" Come let him take his place by me, he shall not rue alone.
" Butt if the smallest sweete be mixte with all his soure
*' If in the daye, the month, the yeere he feele one lightninge
howre.

** Then rest he by him selfe he is no mate for me
" Whose hope is falne, whose succour voyde whose hap his
death must be

" Yet not the wished death which hath no playnt nor lack,
*' Which makynge free the better part is only nature's wracke.
*' Oh no ; that were too good; my death is of the mynde
*' Which bringes allwayes the extremest paynes and leaves the
worst behynde f.

* X- -X- *

" The solytarye woodes my cytye shall become,
*^'The darkest den shall be my lodge wherein I'll rest or run |.
" Of hebon blacke my boorde, the wormes my feast shall be,
Wherwith my carcase shall be fedd untyll they feed on me.

t MS. A. Which allwayes yeeldes extremest paynes yet keepes

the worst behynde."
X MS. A. " Wherein no light shall come."

582

APPENDIX.

" My wine of Niobe * my b£d the craggy rocke,
*' The serpents hiss my harmonye, the skrychyng owlle my
cocke.

** My exercise nought else but raging agonies,
*' My bookes of spytefull fortunes spoylles and dreerye tragedyes
*' My walk the pathes of plaint, my prospect into hell,
*' Where wretched Sysiphe and his pheeres in endless paynes
do dwell.

** And thoughe I seeme to use the poets' fayned style,
*' To figure forth my wofull plight, my fall and my exile.
*• Yet is my woe not faynde, wherein I sterve and pyne ;
" Who feeleth most, shall finde his least comparing his with
myne.

*' My Songe, if any aske — " whose grievous case is such ? "
*' Dyer then let his name be knowne ; his folly showes to
muche.

** Butt best 'twere thee to hide, and never come to lyght,
*' For in the world can none but I thye accents sound aright."
Miserum est Juisse,
E. Dier.
Finis.

* i. e. tears.

SHAKSPEARE'S COAT OF ARMS.

The following Instrument ' is copied from the Original
in the College of Heralds : It is marked G 13, p. 349.

To all and singuler noble and gentlemen of all estats
and degrees, bearing arms, to whom these presents shall
come, William Dethick, Garter, Principall King of Arms
of England, and William Camen, alias Clarencieulx,
King of Arms for the south, east, and west parts of this
realme, sendethe greeting. Know ye, that in all nations
and kingdoms the record and remembraunce of the valeant
facts and vertuous dispositions of worthie men have been
made knowne and divulged by certeyne shields of arms
and tokens of chevalrie ; the grant and testimonie whereof
apperteyneth unto us, by vertu of our offices from the
Queues most Exc. Majestic, and her Highenes most
noble and victorious progenitors : wherefore being soli-
cited, and by credible report informed, that John Shak-
speare, now of Stratford-upon-Avon, in the counte of
Warwick, gent, whose parent, great grandfather, and late
antecessor, for his faithefull and approved service to the
late most prudent prince, king Henry VII. of famous

^ In the Herald's Office are the first draughts of John Shak-
speare's grant or coHfirmation of arms, by William Dethick,
Garter, Principal King at Arms, 1596. See Vincent's Press,
vol. 157, No. 23, and 4. Steevens.

In a Manuscript in the College of Heralds, marked W. 2.
p. 276, is the following note : '* As for the speare in bendy it is a
patible difference, and the person to whom it was granted hath
borne magistracy, and was justice of peace at Stratford-upon-
Avon. He married the daughter and heire of Arderne, and was
able to maintain that estate." Malone.

584

SHAKSPEARE'S COAT OF ARMS.

memorie, was advaunced and rewarded with lands and
tenements, geven to him in those parts of Warwickshere,
where they have continewed by some descents in good
reputacion and credit ; and for that the said John Shak-
speare having maryed the daughter and one of the heyrs
of Robert Arden of Wellingcote, in the said countie, and
also produced this his auncient cote of arms, heretofore
assigned to him whilest he was her Majesties officer and
baylefe of that towne * : In consideration of the premisses,
and for the encouragement of his posteritie, unto whom
suche blazon of arms and achievements of inheritance
from theyre said mother, by the auncyent custome and
lawes of arms, maye lawfully descend; We the said
Garter and Clarencieulx have assigned, graunted, and by
these presents exemplefied unto the said John Shakspeare,
and to his posteritie, that shield and cote of arms, viz.
In a field of gould upon a bend sables a speare of the
first, the poynt upward, hedded argent ; and for his crest
or cognizance, A falcon with his wyngs displayed, stand-
ing on a wrethe of his coullers, supporting a speare armed
hedded, or steeled sylver, fyxed uppon a helmet with mantell
and tassels, as more playnely maye appeare depected on
this margent : and we have likewise uppon on other
escutcheon impaled the same with the auncyent arms of
the said Arden ^ of Wellingcote ; signifieng therby, that
it maye and shalbe lawfull for the said John Shakspeare

* — his auncient cote of arms, heretofore assigned to hira
whilest he was her Majesties officer and baylefe of that towne ;]
This grant of arms was made by Robert Cook, Clarencieux, in
3569, but is not now extant in the Herald's Office. Malone.

3 — and we have likewise — impaled the same with the aun-
cyent arms of the said Arden — ] It is said by Mr. Jacob, the
modern editor of Arden of Feversham (first published in 1592
and republished in 1631 and 1770) that Shakspeare descended by
the female line from the gentleman whose unfortunate end is the
subject of this tragedy. But the assertion appears to want sup-

CONVEYANCE TO SHAKSPEARE. 585

gent, to beare and use the same shield of arms, single or
impaled, as aforsaid, during his natural lyfFe ; and that it
shalbe lawfull for his children, yssue, and posteryte,
(lawfully begotten,) to beare, use, and quarter, and show-
forth the same, with theyre dewe differences, in all law-
full warlyke facts and civile use or exercises, according
to the laws of arms, and custome that to gentlemen
belongethe, without let or interruption of any person or
persons, for use or bearing the same. In wyttnesse and
testemonye whereof we have subscrebed our names, and
fastened the seals of our offices, geven at the Office of
Arms, London, the day of in the xlii

yere of the reigne of our most gratious Sovraigne lady
Elizabeth, by the grace of God, queue of Ingland, France,
and Ireland, defender of the faith, &c. 1599/'

CONVEYANCE FROM WALKER TO SHAKSPEARE,
March 10, 1612-13.

This Indenture made the tenthe day of Marche, in the
yeare of our Lord God according to the computacon of
the church of England one thousand six hundrede and
twelve, and in the yeares of the reigne of our sovereigne
Lord James by the grace of God king of England,
Scotland ffraunce and Ireland, defender of the faith, &c.
that is to saie, of England, ffraunce and Ireland the tenth,
and of Scotland the six and fortith : Betweene Henry

port, the true name of the person who was murdered at Feversham
being Ardern and not Arden. Ardern might be called Arden in
the play for the sake of better sound, or might be corrupted in
the Chronicle of HoHnshed : yet it is unHkely that the true
spelHng should be overlooked among the Heralds, whose interest
it is to recommend by ostentatious accuracy the trifles in which
they deal. Steevens.

Ardern was the original name, but in Shakspeare's time it had
been softened to Arden, Malone.

586 CONVEYANCE TO SHAKSPEARE.

Walker Citizein of London and Minstrel of London of
thone partie, and William Shakespeare of Stratforde
Upon Avon in the countie of Warwick gentleman, Wil-
liam Johnson citizein and Vintner of London, John Jack-
son and John Hemyng of London gentlemen, on thother
ptie : Witnesseth, that the said Henry Walker for and
in considerac5n of the some of one hundred and fortie
pounds of lawful money of England to him in hand before
thensealing hereof by the said William Shakespeare well
and trulie paid, whereof and wherew*^ hee the said Henry
Walker doth acknowledge himselfe fully satisfied and
contented, and thereof and of every part or parcell thereof
doth cleerlie acquite and discharge the saide William
Shakespeare, his heires, executors, admistrators, and
assignes, and every of them, by these puts hath bar-
gayned and soulde, and by theis puts doth fullie cleerlie
and absolutlie bargayne and sell vnto the said William
Shakespeare, William Johnson, John Jackson, and John
Hemyng, theire heires and assignes for ever, All that
dwelling house or Tenement w^^ thappurtenancs situate
and being w^in the Precinct Circuit and Compasse of
the late black fryers London, sometymes in the tenure
of James Gardyner Esqui'% and since that in the tenure
of John fFortescue gent, and now or late being in the
tenure or occupacon of one William Ireland or of his
assignee or assignes ; abutting vpon a streete leading
downe to Puddle WharfFe on the east part, right against
the kings Maiesties Wardrobe ; part of w'^*^ said Tenement
is erected over a great gate leading to a Capitall Mesuage
w*^*" sometyme was in the tenure of William Blackwell
Esqui'^'' deceased, and since that in the tenure or occu-
pacon of the right Honorable Henry now Earl of Nor-
thumberland. And also all that plott of ground on the
west side of the same Tenement w^^ was lately inclosed
w*^ boords on two sides thereof by Anne Bacon, widowe,
soe farre and in such sorte as the same was inclosed by
the said Anne Bacon, and not otherwise ; and being on

CONVEYANCE TO SHAKSPEARE. 587

the thirde side inclosed w^^ an olde Brick wall ; Which
said plott of ground was sometyme parcell and taken out
of a great voide peece of ground lately vsed for a garden ;
and also the soyle wherevppon the said Tenement stand-
eth, and also the said Brick wall and boords w^*^ doe
inclose the said plott of ground : With free entrie, accesse,
ingresse, egresse, and regresse, in by and through the
said greate gate and yarde there vnto the vsual dore of
the said Tenement; And also all and singuler cello^s,
sollers, romes, lights, easiaments, profitts, comodities,
and hereditaments whatsoever, to the said dwelling house
or Tenement belonging or in any wise app'teyning ; And
the reversion and reversions whatsoever of all and singuler
the premisses, and of every parcell thereof ; And also all
rents, and yearlie profitts whatsoever reserved and from
hensforth to growe due and paiable vpon whatsoever lease,
dimise or graunt, leases dimises or graunts, made of the
premisses or of any parcell thereof. And also all the
state, right, title, interest, propertie, vse, possession,
clayme, and demaunde whatsoever w*^^^ hee the said Henry
Walker now hath, or of right may, might, should, or
ought to have, of in or to the premisses or any parcell
thereof; And also all and every the deeds, evidencs,
charters, escripts, miniments, & writings whatsoever w'^''
hee the said Henry Walker now hath, or any other person
or persons to his vse have or hath, or which hee may
lawfullie come by w%out suite in the lawe, which touch
or concerne the premisses onlie, or onlie any part or parcell
thereof. Together w*^'' the true coppies of all such deeds,
evidencs, and writings as concerne the premisses (amounge
other things) to bee written and taken out at the onlie
costs and charg' of the said William Shakespeare his
heires or assignes. Which said dwelling house or Tene-
ment, and other the premisses above by theis prnts men-
c5ned to bee bargayned and soulde the saide Henry
Walker late purchased and had to him his heires and
assignes for ever of Mathie Bacon of Graies Inne in the

588 CONVEYANCE TO SHAKSPEARE.

Countie of Midd gentleman, by Indenture bearing date
the fifteenth day of October in the yeare of our Lord god
one thousand six hundred and fower, and in the yeares of
the reigne of our said Sovereigne Lord king James of his
realmes of England ffraunce and Ireland the second, and
of Scotland the eight and thirtith : To have and to holde
the said dwelling house or Tenement, shopps, cello^s,
sollers, plott of ground and all and singuler other the
premisses above by theis pntes menconed to bee bargayned
and soulde and every part and parcell thereof w^'^ thappur-
tenants, vnto the said William Shakespeare, William
Johnson, John Jackson, and John Hemyng, their heires
and assignes for ever : To thonlie & proper vse and behoofe
of the said William Shakespeare, William Johnson, John
Jackson, and John Hemyng, their heires and assignes for
ever. And the said Henry Walker for himselfe, his heires,
executor's, administrator's, and assignes, and for every of
them, doth Covenant, promise and graunt to and w*'^ the
said William Shakespeare his heires and assignes by theis
pntes in forme following, that is to saie. That hee the
said Henry Walker his heires, executors administrators or
assignes shall and will cleerlie acquite, exonerate, and
discharge or otherwise from tyme to tyme and at all tymes
hereafter well and sufficientlie save and keepe harmles the
said William Shakespeare his heires and assignes and
every of them of for and concernyng the bargayne and
sale of the premisses, and the said bargayned premisses
and every part and parcell thereof w**^ thappurtenancs of
and from all and almanner of former bargaynes, sales,
guifts, graunts, leases, statuts, Recognizauncs, Joynters,
dowers, intailes, lymittacon and lymittacons of vse and
vses, extents and judgments, execucons. Annuities, and
of and from all and every other charge titles and incum-
brancs whatsoever, wittinglie and wilfullie had, made
comitted, suffered, or donne by him the said Henrye
Walker or any other under his authoritie or right, before
thensealing and deliverye of theis puts ; Except the rents

CONVEYANCE TO SHAKSPEARE. 589

and services to the Cheefe Lord or Lords of the fee or fees
of the premisses from hensforth, for or in respecte of his
or their seigniorie or seigniories onlie to be due and donne.
And further the saide Henry Walker for himselfe his
heires executor's and administrator's and for every of them,
doth covenant, promisse and graunt to and w^'^ the said
William Shakespeare, his heires and assignes, by theis
pntes in forme following ; that is to saie. That for and
notw**'standing any acte or thing donne by him the said
Henry Walker to the Contrary, hee the said William
Shakespeare his heires and assignes shall or law^fullie maye
peaceablie & quietlie have, holde, occupie and enioye the
said dwelling house or Tenement, Cellor"s SoUers and all
and singuler other the premisses above by theis pntes
menconed to bee bargayned and soulde and every part and
parcell thereof w*^'' thappurtenances, and the rents yssues
and profitts thereof and of every part and parcell thereof
to his and their owne vse receave perceave take and enioye
from hensforth forever w%out the lett troble eviccon or
interrupcon of the said Henry Walker his heires executor's
or administrators or any of them, or of or by any other
person or persons w^'^ have or may before the date hereof
pretende to have any lawfull estate, righte, title, vse, or
interest, in or to the premisses or any parcell thereof, by
from or under him the said Henry Walker. And also
that hee the said Henry Walker and his heires and all
and every other person and persons and their heires which
have or that shall lawfullie and rightfullie have or clayme
to have any lawfull and rightfuU estate, right, title, or
interest, in or to the premisses or any parcell thereof, by
from or vnder the said Henry Walker, shall and will from
tyme to tyme & at all tymes fromhensforth for and during
the space of three yeares now next ensuing at or vpon the
reasonable request and costs and charg' in the lawe of the
said William Shakespeare his heires and assignes doe
make knowledge and suffer to bee donne made and know-
ledge all and every such further lawfull and reasonable

590 CONVEYANCE TO SHAKSPEARC.

acte and acts, thing and things, devise and devises in the
law whatsoever, for the conveying of the premises, bee
it by deed or deeds inrolled or not inrolled, inrolment of
theis pnts, fyne, feoffament, recoverye, release, confir-
macon, or otherwise, w*^ warrantie of the said Henry
Walker and his heires against him the said Henry Walker
and his heires onlie, or otherwise w%out warrantie, or by
all any or as many of the wayes meanes and devises afore-
said, as by the said William Shakespeare his heires or
assio-nes or his or their Councell learned in the lawe shalbee
reasonablie devised or advised, for the farther, better, and
more perfect assurance suertie suermaking and conveying
of all and singuler the premisses and every parcell thereof
w^" thappurtenancs vnto the said William Shakespeare his
heires and assignes forever to th'use and in forme afore-
said. And further that all and every fyne and fynes to be
levyed, recoveryes to be suffered, estats, and assurancs
at any tyme or tymes hereafter to bee had made executed
or passed by or betweene the said parties of the premisses
or of any parcell thereof, shalbee, and shalbee esteemed,
adiudged, deemed, and taken to bee, to th' onlie and
proper vse and behoofe of the said William Shakespeare,
his heires, and assignes forever ; and to none other vse,
intent or purpose. In witnesse whereof the said parties
to theis Indentures Jnterchaungablie have sett their
scales. Yeoven the day and yeares first above written.

William
Shaksper

W'". Johnson. Jo : Jackson.

Sealed and delivered by the said William Shakespeare,

William Johnson, and John Jackson in the pnce of Will :
Atkinson

Ed : Ouery

Robert Andrewes Scr.

Henry Lawrence servant to the same Scr.

MORTGAGE MADE BY SHAK8PEARE.

A. D. 1612-13.

The following is a transcript of another deed executed
by our author three years before his death. The original
deed, which was found in the year 1768, among the title
deeds of the Rev. Mr. Fetherstonhaugh, of Oxted, in the
county of Surry, is now in the possession of Mrs. Garrick,
by whom it was obligingly transmitted to me through the
hands of the Hon. Mr. Horace Walpole. Much has
lately been said in various publications relative to the
proper mode of spelling Shakspeare's name. It is hoped
we shall hear no more idle babble upon this subject. He
spelt his name himself as I have just now written it, with-
out the middle e. Let this therefore for ever decide the
question.

It should be remembered that to all ancient deeds were
appended labels of parchment, which were inserted at the
bottom of the deed ; on the upper part of which labels
thus rising above the rest of the parchment, the executing
parties wrote their names. Shakspeare, not finding room
for the whole of his name on the label, attempted to
write the remaining letters at top, but having allowed
himself only room enough to write the letter r/, he gave
the matter up. His hand-writing, of which 2i facsimile is
annexed, is much neater than many others, which I have
seen, of that age. He neglected, however, to scrape the
parchment, in consequence of which the letters appear
imperfectly formed.

He purchased the estate here mortgaged, from Henry
Walker, for 140/. as appears from the enrolment of the
deed of bargain and sale now in the Rolls-Chapel, dated
the preceding day, March 10, 1612-13. [See the preced-
ing article.] The deed here printed shows that he paid
down eighty pounds of the purchase-money, and mort-

592 MORTGAGE MADE BY SHAKSPEARE.

gaged the premises for the remainder. This deed and the
purchase deed were probably both executed on the same
day (March 10), like our modern conveyance of Lease and
Release. Ma lone.

" This Indenture made the eleventh day of March, in
the yeares of the reigne of our Sovereigne Lorde James,
by the grace of God, king of England, Scotland, Fraunce,
and Ireland, defender of the Faith, &c. that is to say, of
England, Fraunce and Ireland the tenth, and of Scotland
the six-and-fortieth ; Between William Shakespeare of
Stratford-upon-Avon, in the Countie of Warwick, gentle-
man, William Johnson, Citizen and Vintener of London,
John Jackson, and John Hemyng of London, gentleman,
of thone partie, and Henry Walker, Citizen and Min-
strell of London, of thother partie ; Witnesseth, that the
said William Shakespeare, William Johnson, John Jack-
son, and John Hemyng, have demised, graunted, and to
ferme letten, and by theis presents do demise, graunt, and
to ferme lett unto the said Henry Walker, all that dwelling
house or tenement, with thappurtenaunts, situate and
being within the precinct, circuit and compasse of the
late Black ffryers, London, sometymesin the tenure of James
Gardyner, Esquire, and since that in the tenure of John
Fortescue, gent, and now or late being in the tenure or
occupation of one William Ireland, or of his assignee or
assignees ; abutting upon a streete leading downe to
Puddle Wharfe, on the east part, right against the kings
Majesties Wardrobe ; part of which said tenement is erected
over a greate gate leading to a capitall messuage, which
sometyme was in the tenure of William Blackwell,
Esquire, deceased, and since that in the tenure or occupa-
tion of the right honourable Henry now Earle of Northum-
berlande : And also all that plott of ground on the west
side of the said tenement, which was lately inclosed with
boords on two sides thereof, by Anne Baton, widow, so
farre and in such sorte as the same was inclosed by the

MORTGAGE MADE BY SHAKSPEARE. 593

said Anne Baton, and not otherwise ; and being on the
third side inclosed with an old brick wall ; which said
plott of ground was sometyme parcell and taken out of a
great voyde peece of ground lately used for a garden ;
and also the soyle whereupon the said tenement standeth;
and also the said brick wall and boords which doe inclose
the said plott of ground ; with free entrie, accesse, in-
gresse, and regresse, in, by, and through, the said great
gate and yarde there, unto the usual dore of the said tene-
ment : And also all and singular cellors, soUers, romes,
lights, easiaments, profitts, commodities, and appurte-
naunts whatsoever to the said dwelling-house or tenement
belonging or in any wise apperteyning : to have and
to holde the said dwelling-house or tenement, cellers,
soUers, romes, plott of ground, and all and singular other
the premisses above by theis presents mentioned to bee
demised, and every part and parcell thereof, with thap-
purtenaunts, unto the said Henry Walker, his executors,
administrators, and assignes, from the feast of thannun-
ciacionof the blessed Virgin Marye next coming after the
date hereof, unto thende and terme of One hundred yeares
from thence next ensuing, and fuUie to be compleat and
ended, withoute impeachment of, or for, any manner of
waste : yelding and paying therefore yearlie during the
said terme unto the said William Shakespeare, William
Johnson, John Jackson, and John Hemyng, their heires
and assignes, a pepper corne at the feast of Easter yearly,
yf the same be lawfuUie demaunded, and noe more,
provided alwayes, that if the said William Shake-
speare, his heires, executors, administrators or assignes,
or any of them, doe well and truelie paie or cause to be
paid to the said Henry Walker, his executors, administra-
tors or assigns, the sum of threescore pounds of lawfull
money of England, in and upon the nyne and twentieth
day of September next coming after the date hereof, at,
or in, the nowe dwelling-house of the said Henry Walker,
VOL. II. 2 Q

594 MORTGAGE MADE BY SHAKSPEARE.

situate and being in the parish of Saint Martyn neer
Ludgate, of London, at one entier payment without
delaie ; That then and from thenesforth this presente lease,
demise and graunt, and all and every matter and thing
herein conteyned (other then this provisoe) shall cease,
determine, and bee utterlie voyde, frustrate, and of none
effect, as though the same had never beene had, ne made ;
theis presents or any thing therein conteyned to the con-
trary thereof in any wise notwithstanding. And the said
William Shakespeare for himselfe, his heires, executors,
and administrators, and for every of them, doth cove-
naunt, promisse and graunt to, and with, the said Henry
Walker, his executors, administrators, and assignes, and
everie of them, by theis presentes, that he the said
William Shakespeare, his heires, executors, administrators
or assignes, shall and will cleerlie acquite, exonerate and
discharge, or from tyme to tyme, and at all tymes here-
after, well and sufficientlie save and keepe harmless the
said Henry Walker, his executors, administrators, and
assignes, and every of them, and the said premisses by
theis presents demised, and every parcell thereof, with
thappurtenaunts, of and from all and al manner of former
and other bargaynes, sales, guiftes, graunts, leases, join-
tures, dowers, intailes, statuts, recognizaunces, judg-
ments, executions ; and of, and from, all and every other
charge, titles, troubles, and incumbrances whatsoever by
the said William Shakespeare, William Johnson, John
Jackson, and John Hemyng, or any of them, or by their or
any of their meanes, had made, committed or done,
before thensealing and delivery of theis presents, or here-
after before the said nyne and twentieth day of September
next comming after the date hereof, to bee had, made,
committed or done, except the rents and servits to the
cheef lord or lords of the fee or fees of the premisses, for,
or in respect of, his or their segnorie or seignories onlie,
to bee due and done.

To I'acep.S^aVclji

TRUST BY JOHN HEMINGES. 595

In witnesse whereof the said parties to theis inden-
tures interchangeable have sett their seales. Yeoven the
day and years first above written, 1612 [1612-13.]

"W'"Shakspe. W"™ Johnson. Jo. Jackson.

" Ensealed and delivered by the
said William Shakespeare,
William Johnson, and John
Jackson in the presence of

Will. Atkinson. Robert Andrews, Scr. J
" Ed. Oudry. Henry Lawrence, Ser-

vant to the said Scr.

DECLARATION OF TRUST BY JOHN HEMINGES
AND OTHERS, Feb. 10, 1617-18.

This indenture made the tenth day of fFebruary in
the yeres of the reigne of our sovereigne Lord James, by
the grace of God kinge of England Scotland fFraunce and
Ireland, defender of the faith, &c. That is to say, of Eng-
land, fFraunce, and Ireland, the fifteenth, and of Scotland
the one and fiftith; Between John Jackson and John
Hemynge of London, gentlemen, and William Johnson,
Citizen and Vintnier of London, of thone part, and John
Greene of Clements Inn in the County of Midd. gent, and
Matthew Morryes of Stretford vpon Avon in the County
of Warwick gent, of thother part; Witnesseth, that
the said John Jackson, lohn Hemynge, and William John-
son, as well for and in performance of the confidence and
trust in them reposed by William Shakespeare, deceased,
late of Stretford aforesaid, gent., and to thend and intent
that the lands tenem^^ and hereditam*^ hereafter in theis pnts
menconed and expressed, may be conveyed and assured
according to the true intent and meaning of the last will

^ John Heming did not sign, or seal.
3 i. e. Scrivener.

2! Q 2

596 TRUST BY JOHN HEMINGES.

and testam* of the said William Shakespeare, and for the
some of ffyve shillings of lawfull money of England to them
payd, for and on behalf of Susanna Hall, one of the
daughters of the said William Shakspeare and now wife
of lohn Hall of Stretford aforesaid gent, before then-
sealling and deliury of theis pnts, Have aliened bargained
sold and confirmed, and by theis pnts doe and every of
them doth fully cleerely and absolutely alien bargaine sell
and confirme vnto the said lohn Greene and Matthew
Morry, their heires and assignes for ever. All that dwell-
ing house or tenem* with thapp''tunts scituat and being
within the precinct, circuite, and compase of the late
Black-frieres, London, sometymes in the tenure of James
Gardyner Esquier, and since that in the tenure of lohn
fFortescue gent, and * now or late being in the tenure or
occupacon of one William Ireland or of his Assignee or
Assignes, abutting vpon a street leadinge downe to
Puddle Wharfe, on the east part, right against the kings
Ma*^ warderobe, part of which tenem* is erected over a
great gate leading to a capitall messuage which sometymes
v^as in the tenure of William Blackwell Esquier deceased,
and since that in the tenure or occupac5n of the right
Hono^^^^ Henry Earle of Northumberland, And also all
that plot of ground on the west side of the said tenem*,
which was lately inclosed with boords on twoe sides
thereof by Anne Bacon widdow, soe farr and in such sort
as the same was inclosed by the said Anne Bacon, and
not otherwise ; and being on the third side inclosed with
an ould Brick v^^all ; Which said plot of ground was
sometymes parcell and taken out of a great peece of voyd
ground lately vsed for a garden ; And also the soyle
wherevpon the said tenem^ standeth ; And also the said

4 These words are merely copied from Walker's Conveyance to
Shakspeare, in March, 1612-13. From a subsequent part of this
deed it appears that John Robinson was now the tenant in pos-
session, under a lease made to him by Shakspeare for a term of
years.

TRUST BY JOHN HEMINGES.

597

Brickwall and boords which doe inclose the said plot of
ground ; with free entry, access, ingres, egres, and regres,
in by and through the said great gate and yard there vnto
the vsuall dore of the said tenem^ ; And also all and sin-
guler cellars sollars roomes lights, easem*^ profitts como-
dyties and hereditam*^ whatsoeuer to the said dwelling
house or tenem^ belonging or in any wise apperteyning,
And the revercon and reverc5ns whatsoever of all and sin-
guler the premisses and of every parcell thereof ; And also
all rents and yerely profitts whatsoever reserued and from
henceforth to grow due and payable vpon whatsoeuer
lease demisse or graunt, leases demises or graunts, made
of the premisses or any parcel thereof ; And also all
thestate, right, title, interest, property, vse, clayme, and
demaund whatsoeuer, which they the said John Jackson,
John Hemynge, and William Johnson, now have or any of
them hath or of right may, might, shoold, or ought to
have in the premises : To haue and to holde the said
dwelling howse or tenem*, lights, cellers, sollers, plot of
ground, and all and singuler other the premisses aboue by
theis pnts menconed to be bargained and sold, and every
part and parcell thereof, with thapp'^tnts, vnto the said
John Green and Mathew Morrys their heires and assignes
foreuer ; To the vse and behoofes hereafter in theis pnts
declared menconed expressed and lymitted, and to none
other vse, behoofe, intent, or purpose : That is to say, to
the vse and behoofe of the aforesaid Susanna Hall for
and during the terme of her natural life, and after her de-
ceas to the vse and behoofe of the first sonne of her
body lawfully yssueing, and of the heires males of the body
of the said first sonne lawfully yssueing ; And for the
want of such heires to the vse and behoofe of the second
sonne of the body of the said Susanna lawfully yssueing,
and of the heires males of the body of the said second sonne
lawfully yssueing; and for want of such heires to the vse
of the third sonne of the body of the said Susanna lawfully
yssueing and of the heires males of the body of the said
third son lawfully yssueing; And for want of such

598 TRUST BY JOHN HEMINGES.

heires to the vse and behoofe of the fowerth, fiveth, sixt,
and seaventh sonnes of the body of the said Susanna
lawfully yssueing, and of the severall heirs males of the
severall bodyes of the said fowerth, fiveth, sixt, and
seaventh sonnes, lawfully yssueing, in such manner as it
is before lymitted to be and remeyne to the first, second,
and third sonnes of the body of the said Susanna law-
fully yssueing, and to their heires males as aforesaid ;
And for default of such heires to the vse and behoofe of
Elizabeth Hall daughter of the said Susanna Hall and of the
heires males of her body lawfully yssueing ; and for de-
fault of such heires to the vse and behoofe of Judy th Quiney
now wife of Thomas Quiney of Stretford aforesaid Vintner,
one other of the daughters of the said William Shakespeare
and of the heires males of the body of the said Judith
lawfully yssueing ; And for default of such yssue to the vse
and behoofe of the right heires of the said William Shake-
speare forever. And the said John Jackson for himself,
his heires, executors, admistratots and assignes, and for
every of them, doth covenant, promise, and graunt, to and
with the said John Green and Mathew Morrys and either
of them, their or either of their heires and assignes, by
these pnts. That he the said John Jackson, his heires,
executors, admistrs or assignes, shall and will from tyme
to tyme and at all tymes hereafter within convenient tyme
after every reasonable request to him or them made, well
and sufficiently save and keepe harmeles the said bargained
premisses and every part and parcell thereof, of and from
all and all manner of former bargaines, sales, guifts,
graunts, leases, statu ts, recognizauncs, joynctures, dowers,
intayles, vses, extents, iudgem*^ execu5ns, annewyties,
and of and from all other charges, titles, and incombrauncs
whatsoeuer, wittingly and willingly had, made, comitted,
or done by him the said John Jackson alone, or joynctly
with any other person or persons whatsoeuer ; Excepte the
rente and servics to the Cheiffe Lord or Lords of the fee
or fees of the premisses from henceforth to be due and of
right accustomed to be done. And Except one lease and

TRUST BY JOHN HEMINGES. 599

demise of the premisses with thapp^tnncs heretofore made
by the said William Shakespeare, together with them the
said John Jackson, John Hemynge, and William Johnson,
vnto one John Robinson, now Tennant of the said pre-
misses, for the terme of certen yeres yet to come and un-
expired ; As by the same where vnto relacon be had at
large doth appeare. And the said John Hemynge for
him self, his heires, executors, admistrators, and assignes,
and for every of thern, doth covennt, promise, and graunt,
to and with the said John Greene and Mathew Morrys, and
either of them their and either of their heires and assignes,
by theis prets, That he the said John Hemynge, his heires,
executors, admistrators, or assignes, shall and will from
tyme to tyme and at all tymes hereafter, within conve-
nient tyme after every reasonable request, well and suffi-
ciently save and keepe harmeles the said bargained pre-
misses and every part and parcel thereof of and from all
and all manner of former bargaines, sales, guifts, graunts,
leases, statuts, recognizauncs, ioynctures, dowers, intayles,
vses, extents, judgm^^ execucons, Annewyties, and of and
from all other charges, titles, and incombraunces what-
soever, wittingly and willingly had, made, comitted, or
done by him the said John Hemynge alone, or ioynctly
with any other person or persons whatsoeuer ; Except the
rentes and service to the Chieffe Lord or Lords of the fee
or fees of the premisses from henceforth to be due and of
right accustomed to be done. And except one lease and
demise of the premisses with thapp'"tnants heretofore
made by the said William Shakspeare together with them
the said John Jackson, John Hemyng and William John-
son vnto one John Robinson, now Tennant of the said
premisses, for the terme of certen yeres yet to come and
vnexpired, As by the same wherevnto relacon be had at
large doth appeare. And the said William Johnson for
him self, his heires, executors, admlst"^^ and assignes, and
for every of them, doth covenant promise, and graunt,
to and with the said John Green and Mathew Morryes,
and either of them, their and either of their heires and

600 TRUST BY JOHN HEMINGES.

assignes, by theis pnts. That he the said William Johnson,
his heires, executors, admistrs, or assignes, shall and will
from tyme to tyme and at all tymes hereafter within con-
venient tyme after every reasonable request, well and
sufficiently saue and keepe harmeles the said bargained
premisses and every part and parcell thereof of and from
all and all manner of former bargaines, sales, guifts,
graunts, leases, statuts, recognizauncs, ioynctures, dowers,
intayles, vses, extents, iudgements, execucons, Annewy-
ties, and of and from all other charges, titles, and incom-
brauncs whatsoeuer, wittingly and willingly had made
Oomitted or done by him the said William Johnson alone,
or ioyntly with any other person or persons whatsoeuer ;
Except the rents and service to the Cheiff Lord or Lords
of the fee or fees of the premisses from henceforth to be
due and of right accustomed to be done, And except one
lease and demise of the premisses with thapp'^tnncs here-
tofore made by the said William Shakespeare together
with them the said John Jackson John Hemynge and
William Johnson vnto one John Robinson, now Tennant
of the said premisses, for the term of certen yeres yet to
come and unexpired. As by the same wherevnto relation
be had at large doth appeare. In witnes whereof the
parties aforesaid to theis pnte Indentures have inter-
changeably sett their hands and sealls. Yeoven the
day and yeres first aboue written 1617.

Jo : Jackson John Heminges Wm Johnson
Sealed & delyvered by the within named

John Jackson in the price of Roc : Swale John Prise
Sealed & delyvered by the w'thinamed
Willm Johnson in the p'sence of

Nickolas Harysone John Prise
Sealed and delyvered by the w'thinamed

John Hemynges in the p'nce of

Matty Benson John Prise

Memorand. that the xi*^' day of ffebruarye in the yeres
within written John Robinson tenant of the p'mysses
w*tihnmenc6ed did geve and delyver vnto John Greene

^^^^^

[

SHAKSPEARE'S WILL.

601

within named to the vse of Susanna Hall w'thinnamed five
pence of lawfuU money of England in name of Attornment
in the p'sence of

Matt: Benson
John Prise
by me Richarde Tylor

SHAKSPEARE'S WILL,

From the Original in the Office of the Prerogative Court
of Canterbury,

Vicesimo quinto die Martii S Anno Regni Domini nostri
Jacobi nunc Regis Anglise, &c. decimo quarto, et
Scotiae quadragesimo nono. Anno Domini 1616.

In the name of God, Amen. I William Shakspeare of
Stratford-upon Avon, in the county of Warwick, gent,
in perfect health and memory, (God be praised !) do
make and ordain this my last will and testament in manner
and form following : that is to say :

First, I commend my soul into the hands of God my
creator, hoping, and assuredly believing, through the
only merits of Jesus Christ my Saviour, to be made par-
taker of life everlasting; and my body to the earth
whereof it is made.

Item, I give and bequeath unto my daughter Judith
one hundred aad fifty pounds of lawful English money,
to be paid unto her in manner and form following;
that is to say, one hundred pounds in discharge of her
marriage portion within one year after my decease, with

* Our poet's will appears to have been drawn up in February,
though not executed till the following month ; for February was
first written, and afterwards struck out, and March written over it.

602 SHAKSPEARFS WILL.

consideration after the rate of two shillings in the pound
for so long time as the same shall be unpaid unto her
after my decease ; and the fifty pounds residue thereof,
upon her surrendering of, or giving of such sufficient
security as the overseers of this my will shall like of, to
surrender or grant, all her estate and right that shall de-
scend or come unto her after my decease, or that she
now hath, of, in, or to, one copyhold tenement, with
the appurtenances, lying and being in Stratford-upon-
Avon aforesaid, in the said county of Warwick, being
parcel or holden of the manor of Rowington, unto my
daughter Susanna Hall, and her heirs for ever^

Item, I give and bequeath unto my said daughter
Judith one hundred and fifty pounds more, if she, or any
issue of her body, be living at the end of three years
next ensuing the day of the date of this my will, during
which time my executors to pay her consideration from
my decease according to the rate aforesaid ; and if she
die within the term without issue of her body, then my
will is, and I do give and bequeath one hundred pounds
thereof to my niece 3 Elizabeth Hall, and the fifty pounds
to be set forth by my executors during the life of my
sister Joan Hart, and the use and profit thereof coming,
shall be paid to my said sister Joan, and after her decease
the said fifty pounds shall remain amongst the children
of my said sister, equally to be divided amongst them ;
but if my said daughter Judith be living at the end of the
said three years, or any issue of her body, then my will
is, and so I devise and bequeath the said hundred and

^ This was found to be unnecessary, as it was ascertained that
the copyhold descended to the eldest daughter by the custom of
the manor.

3 — to my NIECE — ] Elizabeth Hall was our poet's grand-
daughter. So, in Othello, Act I. Sc. I. lago says to Brabantio,

You'll have your nephem neigh to you ;" meaning his grand-
children. See the note there.

SHAKSPEARFS WILL.

603

fifty pounds to be set out by my executors and overseers
for the best benefit of her and her issue, and the stock
not to be paid unto her so long as she shall be married
and covert baron ; but my will is, that she shall have the
consideration yearly paid unto her during her life, and
after her decease the said stock and consideration to be
paid to her children, if she have any, and if not, to her
executors or assigns, she living the said term after my
decease : provided that if such husband as she shall at
the end of the said three years be married unto, or at any
[time] after, do sufficiently assure unto her, and the issue
of her body, lands answerable to the portion by this my
will given unto her, and to be adjudged so by my execu-
tors and overseers, then my will is, that the said hundred
and fifty pounds shall be paid to such husband as shall
make such assurance, to his own use.

Item, I give and bequeath unto my said sister Joan
twenty pounds, and all my wearing apparel, to be paid
and delivered within one year after my decease ; and I '
do will and devise unto her the house, with the appur-
tenances, in Stratford, wherein she dwelleth, for her
natural life, under the yearly rent of twelve-pence.

Item, I give and bequeath unto her three sons, Wil-
liam Hart, Hart 4, and Michael Hart, five pounds

apiece, to be paid within one year after my decease.

Item, I give and bequeath unto the said Elizabeth Hall
all my plate, (except my broad silver and gilt bowl) 5,
that I now have at the date of this my will.

4 — Hart,] It is singular that neither Shakspeare nor any of
his family should have recollected the Christian name of his ne-
phew, who was born at Stratford but eleven years before the
making of his will. His Christian name was Thomas ; and he
was baptized in that town, July 24-, 1605. He was at this time,
therefore, between ten and eleven years old.

5 — except my broad silver and gilt bowl,] This bowl, as
we afterwards find, our poet bequeathed to his daughter Judith.

604 SHAKSPEARE'S WILL.

Item, I give and bequeath unto the poor of Stratford
aforesaid ten pounds ; to Mr. Thomas Combe ^ my sword ;
to Thomas Russel, Esq. five pounds; and to Francis
Collins 6 of the borough of Warwick, in the county of
Warwick, gent, thirteen pounds six shillings and eight-
pence, to be paid within one year after my decease.

Item, I give and bequeath to Hamlet [Hamnei] Sadler 7
twenty-six shillings eight-pence, to buy him a ring ; to

Instead of boivl, Mr. Theobald, and all the subsequent editors,
have here printed boxes.

5 — Mr. Thomas Combe,] This gentleman was baptized at
Stratford, Feb. 9, 1588-9; he was therefore twenty-seven years old
at the time of Shakspeare's death. He died at Stratford in July,
1657, aged 68; and his elder brother William died at the same
place, Jan. 30, 1666-7, aged 80. Mr. Thomas Combe, by his will
made June 20, 1656, directed his executors to convert all his
personal property into money, and to lay it out in the purchase of
lands, to be settled on William Combe, the eldest son of John
Combe of Allchurch, in the county of Worcester, Gent, and his
heirs male ; remainder to his two brothers successively. Where
therefore our poet's sword has wandered, I have not been able to
discover. I have taken the trouble to ascertain the ages of Shak-
speare's friends and relations, and the time of their deaths, be-
cause we are thus enabled to judge how far the traditions con-
cerning him, which were communicated to Mr. Rowe in the be-
ginning of this century, are worthy of credit.

6 — to Francis Collins — ] This gentleman was, I believe,
christened at Warwick. He died the year after our poet, and
was buried at Stratford, Sep. 27, 1617, on which day he died.

7 — to Hamnet Sadler — ] This gentleman was godfather to
Shakspeare's only son, who was called after him. Mr. Sadler,
I believe, was born about the year 1550, and died at Stratford-
upon-Avon, where he was buried, October 26, 1624?. His wife
Judith Sadler, who was godmother to Shakspeare's youngest
daughter, was buried there, March 23, 1613-14. Our poet pro-
bably was godfather to their son William, who was baptized at
Stratford, Feb. 5, 1597-8.

SHAKSPEARFS WILL.

605

William Reynolds, gent, twenty-six shillings eight-pence,
to buy him a ring; to my godson, William Walker^,
twenty shillings in gold; to Anthony Nash 9, gent,
twenty-six shillings eight-pence ; and to Mr. John Nash ',
twenty-six shillings eight-pence : and to my fellows, John
Hemynge, Richard Burbage, and Henry Cundell%
twenty-six shillings eight-pence apiece, to buy them
rinses.

Item, I give, will, bequeath, and devise, unto my
daughter Susanna Hall, for better enabling of her to
perform this my will, and towards the performance thereof,
all that capital messuage or tenement, with the appur-
tenances, in Stratford aforesaid, called The New Place,
wherein I now dwell, and two messuages or tenements,
with the appurtenances, situate, lying, and being in
Henley-street, within the borough of Stratford aforesaid ;
and all my barns, stables, orchards, gardens, lands, tene-

* — to my godson William Walker.] This godson of our
author was the son of Mr. Henry Walker, who was elected an
Alderman of Stratford, January 3, 1605-6. William was bap-
tized at Stratford, October 16, 1608. I mention this circum-
stance, because it ascertains that our author was at his native
town in the autumn of that year. Mr. William Walker was
buried at Stratford, March, 1679-80.

9 — to Antony Nash,] He was father of Mr. Thomas Nash,
who married our poet's grand-daughter, Elizabeth Hall. He
lived, I believe, at Welcombe, where his estate lay ; and was
buried at Stratford, Nov. 18, 1622.

» — to Mr. John Nash,] This gentleman died at Stratford,
and was buried there, Nov. 10, 1623.

* — to my fellows, John Hemynge, Richard Burbage, and
Henry Cundell.] These our poet's Jelloius did not very long sur-
vive him. Burbage died in March, 1619 ; Cundell in December,
1627; and Heminge in October, 1630. See their wills in the
Account of our old Actors in the third volume.

606 SHAKSPEARE'S WILL.

ments, and hereditaments whatsoever, situate, lying, and
being, or to be had, received, perceived 3, or taken, within
the towns, hamlets, villages, fields, and grounds of
Stratford-upon-Avon, Old Stratford, Bishopton, and
Welcombe ^ or in any of them, in the said county of
Warwick ; and also that messuage or tenement, with the
appurtenances, wherein one John Robinson dwelleth,
situate, lying, and being, in the Blackfriars in London
near the Wardrobe ^ ; and all other my lands, tenements,
and hereditaments whatsoever ; to have and to hold all

3 — received, perceived,] Instead of these words, we have
hitherto had in all the printed copies of this will reserved,
preserved.

4 — Old Stratford, Bishopton, and Welcombe,] The lands of
Old Stratford, Bishopton, and Welcome, here devised, were in
Shakspeare's time a continuation of one large field, all in the pa-
rish of Stratford. Bishopton is two miles from Stratford, and
Welcombe one. For Bishopton, Mr. Theobald erroneously
printed Bushaxton, and the errour has been continued in all the
subsequent editions. The word in Shakspeare's original will is
Bushopton, the vulgar pronunciation of Bishopton.

I searched the Indexes in the Rolls chapel from the year 1589
to 1616, with the hope of finding an enrolment of the purchase
deed of the estate here devised by our poet, and of ascertaining its
extent and value ; but it was not enrolled during that period, nor
could I find any inquisition taken after his death, by which its
value might have been ascertained. I suppose it was conveyed
by the former owner to Shakspeare, not by bargain and sale, but
by a deed of feoft'ment, which it was not necessary to enroll.

5 — that messuage or tenement — in the Blackfriars in London
near the Wardrobe ;] This was the house which was mort-
gaged to Henry Walker.

By the Wardrobe is meant the King s Great Wardrobe, a royal
house, near Puddle Wharf, purchased by King Edward the Third
from Sir John Beauchamp, who built it. King Richard III. was
lodged in this house in the second year of his reign. See Stowe's

SHAKSPEARE'S WILL. 607

and singular the said premises, with their appurtenances,
unto the said Susanna Hall, for and during the term of her
natural life ; and after her decease to the first son of her
body lawfully issuing, and to the heirs males of the body of
the said first son lawfully issuing ; and for default of such
issue, to the second son of her body lawfully issuing, and
to the heirs males of the body of the said second son
lawfully issuing ; and for default of such heirs, to the
third son of the body of the said Susanna lawfully issuing,
and to the heirs males of the body of the said third son
lawfully issuing ; and for default of such issue, the same
so to be and remain to the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh
sons of her body, lawfully issuing one after another, and
to the heirs males of the bodies of the said fourth, fifth,
sixth, and seventh sons lawfully issuing, in such manner
as it is before limited to be and remain to the first, second,
and third sons of her body, and to their heirs males ;
and for default of such issue, the said premises to be and
remain to my said niece Hall, and the heirs males of her
body lawfully issuing ; and for default of such issue, to
my daughter Judith, and the heirs males of her body law-
fully issuing ; and for default of such issue, to the right
heirs of me the said William Shakspeare for ever.

Item, I give unto my wife my second-best bed, with
the furniture ^ ,

Survey, p. 693, edit. 1618. After the fire of London this office
was kept in the Savoy; but it is now abolished.

^ — my SECoND-best bed, with the furniture.] Thus Shak-
speare's original will. Mr. Theobald and the other modern edi-
tors have been more bountiful to Mrs. Shakspeare, having printed
instead of these words, *' — my brovon best bed, with the fur-
niture." Malone.

It appears, in the original will of Shakspeare (now in the Pre-
rogative-Office, Doctors' Commons), that he had forgot his wife ;
the legacy to her being expressed by an interlineation, as well as
those to Heminge, Burbage, and Condell.

608

SHAKSPEARE'S WILL.

Item, I give and bequeath to my said daughter Judith
my broad silver gilt bowl. All the rest of my goods,
chattels, leases, plate, jewels, and household-stuff what-
soever, after my debts and legacies paid, and my funeral
expences discharged, I give, devise, and bequeath to
my son-in-law, John Hall, gent, and my daughter Susanna
his wife, whom I ordain and make executors of this my
last will and testament. And I do entreat and appoint
the said Thomas Russel, esq. and Francis Collins, gent,
to be overseers hereof. And do revoke all former wills,
and publish this to be my last will and testament. In
witness whereof I have hereunto put my hand, the day
and year first above-written.

By me ^ William Shakspeare.
Witness to the publishing hereof,
Fra. Collyns 7,
Julius Shaw ,
John Robinson 9,
Hamnet Sadler %
Robert Whattcoat.

Probatum fuit testamentum suprascriptum apud
London, coram Magistro William Byrde, Legum
Doctore, &c. vicesimo secundo die mensis Junii,
Anno Domini 1616; juramento Johannis Hall unius
ex. cui, &c. de bene, &c. jurat, reservata potestate,
&c. Susannae Hall alt. ex. &c. eam cum venerit, &c.
petitur. &c.^

The will is written on three sheets of paper, the two last of
which are undoubtedly subscribed with Shakspeare's own hand.
The first indeed has his name in the margin, but it differs some-
what in spelling as well as manner, from the two signatures that
follow. The reader will find a fac-simile of all the three, as
well as those of the witnesses, on the opposite page. Steevens.

^ By me William Shakspeare.] This was the mode of our
poet's time. Thus the Register of Stratford is signed at the bot-
tom of each page, in the year 1616, *' Per me Richard Watts,

SHAKSPEARE'S WILL. 609

Minister." These concluding words have hitherto been inaccu-
rately exhibited thus : " — the day and year first above-uoritten ^
by me William Shakspeare." Neither the day, nor year, nor any
preceding part of this will, was written by our poet. " By me,"
&c. only means — The above is the uoill of me William Shakspeare.
7 — Fra. Collins.] See p. 604<, n. 6.

^ — Julius Shaw — ] was born in Sept. 1571. He married
Anne Boyes, May 5, 1594? ; and died at Stratford, where he was
buried, June 24, 1629.

^ — John Robinson.] John, son of Thomas Robinson, was
baptized at Stratford, Nov. 30, 1589. I know not when he died.

* — Hamnet Sadler.] See p. 604, n. 7.

^ The total omission of his wife's name by Shakspeare in the
first draft of his will, and the very moderate legacy he afterwards
inserted, has created a suspicion that his affections were estranged
from her either through jealousy or some other cause. But if we
may suppose that some provision had been made for her during
his life-time, the bequest of his second-best bed was probably con/-
sidered in those days neither as uncommon nor reproachful. Sir
Thomas Lucy, the younger, by his will in 1600, of which I find an
account among Mr. Malone's Adversaria, leaves to his second
son, Richard, his second-best horse, but no land, because his father-
in-law had promised to provide for him. Shakspeare's not re-
collecting at first to mention her name at all, will be no great
subject of surprise, when we recollect the remarkable instances of
forgetfulness which perpetually occur in documents of this na-
ture. He had forgotten also, at first, his fellows, Heminge, Bur-
bage, and Condell, upon whom he certainly did not intend to fix a
stigma. If he had taken offence at any part of his wife's conduct,
I cannot believe that he would have taken this petty mode of ex-
pressing it, BoSWELL.

VOL. IL

STRATFORD REGISTER.

Baptisms, Marriages, and Burials, of the Shakspeare
Family ; transcribed from, the Register- Books of the Parish
of Stratford'upon-Avorij Warwickshire 4.

Jone5, daughter to John Shakspere, was baptized

Sept. 15, 1558.
Margaret, daughter of John Shakspere, was baptized

Dec. 2, 1562.

Margaret, daughter of John Shakspere, was buried

April 30, 1563.
WILLIAM, son of John Shakspere, was baptized April

26, 1564^

Johanna, daughter of Richard Hathaway, otherwise
Gardiner, of Shottery 7, was baptized May 9, 1566.

4 An inaccurate and very imperfect list of the baptisms, &c. of
Shakspeare's family was transmitted by Mr. West some years ago
to Mr. Steevens. The list now printed I have extracted with
great care from the Registers of Stratford ; and, I trust, it will be
found correct.

[Those marked with an asterisk, according to Mr. Malone's
hypothesis, did not belong to the poet's family. See p. 51 .]

5 This lady Mr. West supposed to have married the ancestor
of the Harts of Stratford ; but he was certainly mistaken. She
died probably in her infancy. The wife of Mr. Hart was un-
doubtedly the second Jone, mentioned below. Her son Michael
was born in the latter end of the year 1608, at which time she
was above thirty-nine years old. The elder Jone would then
have been near fifty.

^ He was born three days before, April 23, 1564<. I have said
this on the faith of Mr. Green, who, I find, made the extract from
the register which Mr. West gave Mr. Steevens ; but quaere, how
did Mr. Green ascertain this fact?

^ This Richard Hathaway of Shottery was probably the father

STRATFORD REGISTER. 611

Gilbert, son of John Shakspere, was baptized Oct. 13,
1566.

Jone ^, daughter of John Shakspere, was baptized April 15,
1569.

Anne, daughter of Mr. John Shakspere, was baptized

Sept. 28, 1578.
Richard, son of Mr. John Shakspere, was baptized

March 11, 1573 [1573-4].
Anne, daughter of Mr. John Shakspere, was buried

April 4, 1579.

Edmund, son of Mr. John Shakspere, was baptized May 3,
1580.

Susanna, daughter of William Shakspere, was bap-
tized May 26, 1583.

Elizabeth, daughter of Anthony Shakspere, of Hampton 9,
was baptized February 10, 1583 [1583-4].

to Anne Hathaivat/, our poet's wife. There is no entry of her
baptism, the Register not commencing till 1558, two years after
she was born. Thomas, the son of this Richard Hathaway, was
baptized at Stratford, April 12, 1569; John, another son, Feb. 3,
1574-; and William, another son, Nov. 30, 1578.

^ It was common in the age of Queen Elizabeth to give the
same christian name to two children successively. (Thus,
Mr. Sadler, who was godfather to Shakspeare's son, had two
sons who were baptized by the name of John,) This was un-
doubtedly done in the present instance. The former Jone having
probably died, (though I can find no entry of her burial in the
Register, nor indeed of many of the other children of John Shaks-
peare) the name of Jone, a very favourite one in those days, was
transferred to another new-born child. This latter Jone married
Mr. William Hart, a hatter in Stratford, some time, as I con-
jecture, in the year 1599, when she was thirty years old ; for her
eldest son William was baptized there, August 28, 1600. There
is no entry of her marriage in the Register.

9 There was also a Mr. Henry Shakspeare settled at Hampton-
Lucy, as appears from the Register of that parish :

2 E 2

612 STRATFORD REGISTER.

* John Shakspere and Margery Roberts were marrie«i

Nov. 25, 1584.
Hamnet^ and Judith, son and daughter of William

Shakspere, were baptized February 2, 1584

[1584-5.]

Lettice, daughter of Henry Shakspeare, was baptized, June 10,
1582.

James, son of Henry Shakspeare, was baptized, October 15,
1585.

James, son of Henry Shakspeare, was buried September 25,
1589.

There was a Thomas Shakspeare settled at Warwick ; for in
the Rolls Chapel I found the inrolment of a deed made in the
44th year of Queen Elizabeth, conveying *' to Thomas Shak-
speare of Warwick, yeoman, Sachbroke, alias Bishop-Sachbroke,
in Com. Warw." Malone.

* Mr. West, or Mr. Green (who made the extract for him),
imagined that our poet's only son was christened by the name of
Samuel, but he was mistaken. Mr. Hamnet Sadler, who was
related, if I mistake not, to the Shakspeare family, appears to
have been sponsor to his son ; and his wife, Mrs. Judith Sadler,
to have been godmother to Judith, the other twin-child. The
name Hamnet is written very distinctly both in the entry of the
baptism and burial of this child. Hamnet and Hamlet seem to
have been considered as the same name, and to have been used
indiscriminately both in speaking and writing. Thus, this Mr.
Hamnet Sadler, who is a witness to Shakspeare's Will, writes
his christian name, Hamnet ; but the scrivener who drew up the
will, writes it Hamlet. There is the same variation in the Re-
gister of Stratford, where the name is spelt in three or four diffe-
rent ways. Thus among the baptisms we find in 1591, '* May 26,
John filius Hamtof Sadler ;" and in 1583, " Sept. 13, Margaret,
daughter to Hamlet Sadler.'* But in 1588, Sept. 20, we find,
**John, son to Hamnet Sadler;" in 1596, April 4, we have
" Judith, filia Hamnet Sadler ;" in 1597-8, " Feb. 3, Wilelmus,
filius Hambnet Sadler; and in 1599, " April 23, Francis, filius
Hamnet Sadler." This Mr. Sadler died in 1624, and the entry
of his burial, which was made by Mr. Simon Trappe, curate of the

STRATFORD REGISTER

613

* Margery, wife of John Shakspere, was buried Oct. 29,

1587.

* Thomas son of Richard Queeny, was baptized Feb.

26, 1588 [1588-9].

* Ursula 3, daughter of John Shakspere, was baptized

March 11, 1588 [1588-9].

* Thomas Greene, alias Shakspere 4, was buried March 6,

1589 [1589-90].

parish, stands thus: " 1624, Oct, 26, Hamlet Sadler." So also
in that of his wife: *' 1623, March 23, Judith, uxor Hamlet
Sadler."

The name of Hamlet occurs in several other entries in the Re-
gister. Oct. 4, 1576, " Hamlet, son to Humphry Holdar," was
buried ; and Sept. 28, 1564, " Catharina, uxor Hamoleti Hassal."
Mr. Hamlet Smith, formerly of the borough of Stratford, is one
of the benefactors annually commemorated there.

Our poet's only son, Hamnet, or Hamlet, died in 1596, in the
twelfth year of his age.

* This gentleman married our poet's youngest daughter. He
had three sisters, Elizabeth, Anne, and Mary, and five brothers ;
Adrian, born in 1586, Richard, born in 1587, William, born in
1593, John in 1597, and George, baptized April 9, 1600. George
was curate of the parish of Stratford, and died of a consumption.
He was buried there April 11, 1624. In Doctor Hall's pocket-
book is the following entry relative to him : " 38, Mr. Quiney,
tussi gravi cum magna phlegmatis copia, et cibi vomitu, feb. lenta
debilitatus," &c. The case concludes thus : *' Anno seq. (no year
is mentioned in the case, but the preceding case is dated 1624,)
in hoc malum incidebat. Multa frustia tentata ; — placide cum
Domino dormit. Fuit boni indolis, et pro juveni omnifariam
doctus."

3 This Ursula, and her brothers Humphrey and Philip, ap-
pear to have been the children of John Shakspeare the shoemaker.

4 A great many names occur in this Register, with an alias,
the meaning of which it is not very easy to ascertain. I should
have supposed that the persons thus described were illegitimate ;
but that in the Register we frequently find the word bastard ex-
pressly added to the names of the children baptized.

614

STRATFORD REGISTER.

* Humphrey, son of John Shakspere, was baptized May

24, 1590.

* Philip, son of John Shakspere, was baptized Sept. 21,

1591.

Thomas 3, son of Mr. Anthony Nash, was baptized June
20, 1593.

Hamnet, son of William Shakspeare, was buried

Aug. 11, 1596.
William, son of William Hart, was baptized Aug. 28,

1600.

Mr. John Shakspeare was buried Sept. 8, 1601.
Mr. Richard Quiney*, Bailiff of Stratford, was buried
May 31, 1602.

Mary, daughter of William Hart, was baptized June 5,
1603.

Thomas, son of William Hart, hatter, was baptized July
24, 1605.

The Rev. Mr. Davenport observes to me that there are two fa-
milies at present in Stratford, (and probably several more) that
are distinguished by an alias, ** The real name of one of these
families is Roberts^ but they generally go by the name of Burford,
The ancestor of the family came originally from Burford in Ox-
fordshire, and was frequently called from this circumstance by
the name of Burford, This name has prevailed, and they are
always now called by it; but they write their name, Roberts,
alias Burford, and are so entered in the Register.

'* The real name of the other family is Smith, but they are
more known by the name of Buck. The ancestor of this family,
from some circumstance or other, obtained the nickname of Buck,
and they now write themselves Smith, alias Buck.

5 This gentleman married our poet's grand-daughter, Eliza-
beth Hall. His father, Mr. Anthony Nash, lived at Welcombe,
(where he had an estate), as appears by the following entry of
the baptism of another of his sons ; " 1598, Oct. 15, John, son
to Mr. Anthony Nash, of Welcombe."

^5 This was the father of Mr. Thomas Quiney, who married
Shakspeare's youngest daughter.

STRATFORD REGISTER. 615

John Hall, gentleman, and Susanna Shakspere, were mar-
ried June 5, 1607.

Mary, daughter of William Hart, was buried Dec. 17,
1607.

Elizabeth, daughter of John Hall, gentleman, was bap-
tized Feb. 21, 1607 [1607-8].

Mary Shakspere, widow, was buried Sept. 9, 1608.

Michael, son of William Hart, was baptized Sept. 23,
1608.

Gilbert Shakspeare, adolescens 7, was buried Feb. 3, 1611
[1611-12].

Richard Shakspere, was buried February 4, 1612
[1612-13].

Thomas Queeny and Judith Shakspere were married

Feb. 10, 1615 [1615-16].
William Hart^, hatter, was buried April 17, 1616.
WILLIAM SHAKSPERE 9, gentleman, was buried April

25,1616'.

Shakspere, son of Thomas Quiney, gentleman, was bap-
tized Nov. 23, 1616.

Shakspere, son of Thomas Quiney, gentleman, was buried
May 8, 1617.

Richard, son of Thomas Quiney, was baptized Feb. 9,

1617 [1617-18].
Thomas, son of Thomas Quiney, was baptized Aug. 29,

1619.

7 This was probably a son of Gilbert Shakspeare, our poet's
brother. When the elder Gilbert died, the Register does not
inform us ; but he certainly died before his son.

^ This William Hart was our poet's brother-in-law. He died,
it appears, a few days before Shakspeare.

9 He died, as appears from his monument, April 23d.

» No one hath protracted the Life of Shakspeare beyond 1616,
except Mr. Hume, who is pleased to add a year to it, contrary
to all manner of evidence. Farmer.

616

STRATFORD REGISTER.

Anthony Nash, Esq. 3 was buried Nov. 18, 1622.

Mrs. Shakspere 4 was buried Aug. 8, 1623.

Mr. Thomas Nash was married to Mrs. Elizabeth Hall,

April 22, 1626.
Thomas 5, son of Thomas Hart, was baptized April 13,

1634.

Dr. John Hall ^ [' ' medicus peritissimus was buried
Nov. 26, 1635.

3 Father of Mr. Thomas Nash, the husband of Elizabeth Hall.
* This lady, who was the poet's widow, and whose maiden
name was Anne Hathaway, died, as appears from her tomb-stone
at the age of 67, and consequently was near eight years older
than her husband. The following is the inscription on her tomb-
stone in the Church of Stratford :

'* Here lyeth interred the body of Anne, wife of William
Shakespeare, who departed this life the 6th day of August 1623,
being of the age of 67 years."

After this inscription followsix Latin verses not worth preserving.
I have not been able to ascertain when or where they were mar-
ried, but suspect the ceremony was performed at Billesley, in
August 1582. The register of that parish is lost.

5 It appears from Lady Barnard's will that this Thomas Hart
was alive in 1669. The Register does not ascertain the time of
his death, nor that of his father.

^ Susanna's husband, Dr. John Hall, is interred in the chancel
of the church of Stratford near his wife.

The following is a transcript of his will, extracted from the
Registry of the Prerogative Court of Canterbury :

*' The last Will and Testament nuncupative of John Hall of
Stratford-upon-Avon in the county of Warwick, Gent, made and
declared the five and twentieth of November, 1635. Imprimis,
I give unto my wife my house in London. Item, I give unto my
daughter Nash my house in Acton. Item, I give unto my daughter
Nash my meadow. Item, I give my goods and money unto my
wife and my daughter Nash, to be equally divided betwixt them.
Item, concerning my study of books, I leave them, said he, to you,
my son Nash, to dispose of them as you see good. As for my

STRATFORD REGISTER.

617

George, son of Tliomas Hart, was baptized Sept. 18,
1636.

manuscripts, I would have given them to Mr. Boles, if he had
been here ; but forasmuch he is not here present, you may, son
Nash, burn them, or do with them what you please. Witnesses
hereunto,

Thomas Nash,
" Simon Trapp."
The testator not having appointed any executor, administration
was granted to his widow, Nov. 23, 1636.

Some at least of Dr. Hall's manuscripts escaped the flames, one
of them being yet extant. See p. 505.

I could not, after a very careful search, find the will of Susanna
Hall in the Prerogative-office, nor is it preserved in the
Archives of the diocese of Worcester, the Registrar of which
diocese at my request very obligingly examined the indexes of all
the wills proved in his office between the years 1649 and 1670;
but in vain. The town of Stratford-upon-Avon is in that diocese.

The inscriptions on the tomb-stones of our poet's favourite
daughter and her husband are as follows :

*• Here lyeth the body of John Hall, Gent, he marr. Susanna,
ye daughter and co-heire of Will. Shakspeare, Gent, he deceased
Nov. 25, A°. 1635, aged 60."

" Hallius hie situs est, medica celeberrimus arte,

** Expectans regni gaudia Iseta Dei.
'* Dignus erat meritis qui Nestora vinceret annis ;

" In terris omnes sed rapit sequa dies.
" Ne tumulo quid desit, adest fidissima conjux,
*' Et vitse comitem nunc quoque mortis habet."
These verses should seem, from the last two lines, not to have
been inscribed on Dr. Hall s tomb-stone till 164'9. Perhaps in-
deed the last distich only was then added.

Here lyeth the body of Susanna, wife to John Hall, Gent,
y* daughter of William Shakspeare, Gent. She deceased the
ilth of July, A°. 1649, aged 66."

*' Witty above her sexe, but that's not all,
'* Wise to salvation was good Mistriss Hall,

618 STRATFORD REGISTER.

Thomas, son of Thomas Quiney, was buried Jan. 28,
1638 [1638-9].

Something of Shakspeare was in that, but this

'* Wholy of him with whom she's now in blisse.
** Then, passenger, hast ne're a teare,

*' To weepe with her that wept with all :
" That wept, yet set her selfe to chere

" Them up with comforts cordiall.

Her love shall live, her mercy spread,
*' When thou hast ne're a teare to shed."

The foregoing English verses, which are preserved by Dugdale,
are not now remaining, half of the tomb-stone having been cut
away, and another half stone joined to it; with the following
inscription on it — " Here lyeth the body of Richard Watts of
Ryhon-Clifford, in the parish of old Stratford, Gent, who de-
parted this life the 23d of May, Anno Dom. 1707, and in the
46th year of his age." This Mr. Watts, as I am informed by the
Rev. Mr. Davenport, was owner of, and lived at the estate of
Ryhon-Clifford, which was once the property of Dr. Hall.

Elizabeth, our poet's grand-daughter, who appears to have been
a favourite, Shakspeare having left her by his will a memorial of
his affection, though she at that time was but eight years old, was
born in February 1607-8, as appears by an entry in the Register
of Stratford, which Mr. West omitted in the transcript with which
he furnished Mr. Steevens. I learn from the same Register that
she was married in 1626: "Marriages. April 22, 1626, Mr.
Thomas Nash to Mistriss Elizabeth Hall." It should be remem-
bered that every unmarried lady was called Mistress till the time
of George I. Hence our author's Mistresse Anne Page. Nor in
speaking of an unmarried lady could her Christian namebe omitted,
as it often is at present; for then no distinction would have
remained between her and her mother. Some married ladies
indeed were distinguished from their daughters by the title of
Madam.

The following is the inscription on Mr. Nash's tomb-stone in
the chancel of the church of Stratford :

*' Here resteth y'^body of Thomas Nashe, Esq. He mar. Eli-

STRATFORD REGISTER.

619

Richard, son of Thomas Quiney, was buried Feb. 26,
1638 [1638-9].

zabeth thedaiigh. and heire of John Hall, Gent. He died April
4th, AM647, aged 53."

" Fata manent omnes ; hunc non virtute carentem,

** Ut neque divitiis, abstulit atra dies.
" Abstulit, at referet lux ultima. Siste, viator ;
" Si peritura paras, per male parta peris."
The letters printed in Italicks are now obliterated.
By his last will, which is in the Prerogative-Office, dated Au-
gust 26, 1642, he bequeathed to his well beloved wife, Elizabeth
Nash, and her assigns, for her life (in lieu of jointure and
thirds), one messuage or tenement, with the appurtenances,
situate in the Chapel Street in Stratford, then in the tenure and
occupation of Joan Norman, widow; one meadow, known by
the name of the Square Meadow, with the appurtenances, in
the parish of old Stratford, lying near unto the great stone-bridge
of Stratford ; one other meadow with the appurtenances, known
by the name of the Wash Meadow; one little meadow with the
appurtenances, adjoining to the said Wash Meadow ; and also all
the tythes of the manor or lordship of Shottery. He devises to
his kinsman Edward Nash, the son of his uncle George Nash of
London, his heirs and assigns {inter alia), the messuage or
tenement, then in his own occupation, called The New-Place,
situate in the Chapel Street, in Stratford ; together with all and
singular houses, outhouses, barns, stables, orchards, gardens, ease-
ments, profits, or commodities, to the same belonging ; and also
fovir-yard land of arable land, meadow, and pasture, with the appur-
tenances, lying and being in the common fields of Old Stratford,
with all the easements, profits, commons, commodities, and here-
ditaments, of the same four-yard lands belonging ; then in the
tenure, use, and occupation of him the said Thomas Nash; and one
other messuage or tenement, with the appurtenances, situate in

the parish of , in London, and called or known by the name

of The Wardrobe, and then in the tenure, use, and occupation

of Dickes. And from and after the death of his said wife, he

bequeaths the meadows above named, and devised to her for life,
to his said cousin Edward Nash, his heirs and assigns for ever.

620 STRATFORD REGISTER.

William Hart 7 was buried March 29, 1639.
Mary, daughter of Thomas Hart, was baptized June 18,
1641.

Joan Hart, widow, was buried Nov. 4, 1646.

Thomas Nash, Esq. was buried April 5, 1647.

Mrs. Susanna Hall, widow, was buried July 16, 1649.

After various other bequests, he directs that one hundred pounds,
at the least, be laid out in mourning gowns, cloaks, and apparel,
to be distributed among his kindred and friends, in such manner
as his executrix shall think fit. He appoints his wife Elizabeth
Nash his residuary legatee, and sole executrix, and ordains
Edmund Rawlins, William Smith, and John Easton, overseers
of his will, to which the witnesses are John Such, Michael
Jonson, and Samuel Rawlins.

By a nuncupative codicil dated on the day of his death, April
4-th, 164<7, he bequeaths {inter alia) " to his mother Mrs. Hall
fifty pounds ; to Elizabeth Hathaway fifty pounds ; to Thomas
Hathaway fifty pounds ; to Judith Hathaway ten pounds ; to his
uncle Nash and his aunt, his cousin Sadler and his wife, his
cousin Richard Quiney and his wife, his cousin Thomas Quiney
and his wife, twenty shillings each, to buy them rings." The
meadows which by his will he had devised to his wife for life,
he by this codicil devises to her, her heirs and assigns, for ever,
to the end that they may not be severed from her own land ; and
he " appoints and declares that the inheritance of his land given
to his cousin Edward Nash should be by him settled, after his
decease, upon his son Thomas Nash, and his heirs, and for want
of such heirs then to remain and descend to his own right
heirs."

It is observable that in this will the testator makes no mention
of any child, and there is no entry of any issue of his marriage
in the Register of Stratford ; I have no doubt, therefore, that he
died without issue.

It has been supposed that the family of Miller of Hide-Hall,
in the county of Herts, were descended from Dr. Hall's daughter
Elizabeth ; and to prove this fact, the following pedigree was
transmitted some years ago by Mr. Whalleyto Mr. Steevens :

STRATFORD REGISTER. 621

Mr. Richard Queeny ^, gent, of London, was buried May
23, 1656.

George Hart, son of Thomas Hart, was married by Francis
Smyth, Justice of peace, to Hester Ludiate, daughter
ofThomasLudiate, Jan. 9, 1657 [1657-8].

Elizabeth, daughter of George Hart, was baptized Jan. 9,
1658 [1658-9].

Jane, daughter of George Hart, was baptized Dec. 21,
1661.

Judith, wife of Thomas Quiney, gent, was buried Feb. 9,
1661 [1661-2].

John Hall =j= Susanna, daughter and co-heiress of
I William Shakspeare.

Elizabeth Hall==Thomas Nash, Esq.

A daughter ==Sir Reginald Forster, of Warwickshire.

Franklyn Mill er= Jane Forster.
of Hide-Hall,
CO. Hertford.

Nicholas Miller ==Mary

Nicholas Franklyn Miller of Hide-
Hall, the only surviving branch
of the family of Miller.

But this pedigree is founded on a mistake, and there is un-
doubtedly no lineal descendant of Shakspeare now living. The
mistake was, the supposing that Sir Reginald Forster married a
daughter of Mr. Thomas Nash and Elizabeth Hall, who had no
issue, either by that gentleman or her second husband. Sir John
Barnard. Sir Reginald Forster married the daughter of Edward
Nash, Esq. of East Greenwich, in the county of Kent, cousin-
german to Mr. Thomas Nash ; and the pedigree ought to have
been formed thus :

622

STRATFORD REGISTER.

Susanna, daughter of George Hart, was baptized March
18, 1663-4].

Antony Nash

George Nash=

Tho. Nash=Elizabeth Hall^Sir John Barnard.

Edward Nash==

Thomas Nash. Jane Nash. Mary Nash=Reginald Forster, Esq.

I afterwards Sir Regi-
nald Forster, Bart.

Reginald Forster. Mary Forster. Franklyn Miller= Jane Forster.

of Hide-Hall, I
CO. Hertford.

Will. NorclifFe, Esq.= Jane Miller. Nicholas Miller=Mary — .

Nicholas Franklyn Miller =

— Mundy, Esq. == Miller.

Edward Miller Mundy, Esq. the
present owner of Hide-Hall.
That I am right in this statement, appears from the will of
Edward Nash (see p. 619), and from the following ^inscription
on a monument in the church of Stratford, erected some time
after the year 1733, by Jane NorclifFe, the wife of William Nor-
cliffe, Esq. and only daughter of Franklyn Miller, by Jane
Forster :

P. M. S.

" Beneath lye interred the body's of Sir Reginald Forster, Ba-
ronet, and dame Mari/ his wife, daughter of Edxmrd Nash of

STRATFORD REGISTER. 623

Shakspeare, son of George Hart, was baptized Nov. 18,
1666.

East Greenwich, in the county of Kent," &c. For this inscrip-
tion I am indebted to the kindness of the Rev. Mr. Davenport,
Vicar of Stratford-upon-Avon.

Reginald Forster, Esq. who lived at Greenwich, was created a
Baronet, May 4, 1661. His son Reginald, who married Miss
Nash, succeeded to the title on the death of his father, some
time after the year 1679. Their only son, Reginald, was buried
at Stratford, Aug. 10, 1685 ; and their daughter Jane, the wife
of Francklyn Miller, Esq. was buried there in Feb. 1731-2.

Mrs. Elizabeth Nash was married to her second husband. Sir
John Barnard, at Billesley, about three miles from Stratford-
upon-Avon, June 5, 1649, and was buried at Abington, in the
county of Northampton, Feb. 17, 1669-70; and with her the
family of our poet became extinct.

Sir John Barnard of Abington, a small village about a mile
from the town of Northampton, was created a Knight by King
Charles II. Nov. 25, 1661. In 1671 he sold the manor and
advowson of the church of Abington, which his ancestors had
possessed for more than two hundred years, to William Thursby,
Esq. Sir John Barnard was the eldest son of Baldwin Barnard,
Esq. by Eleanor, daughter and co-heir of John Fulwood of Ford
Hall in the county of Warwick, Esq. and was born in 1605. He
first married Elizabeth, the daughter of Sir Clement Edmonds of
Preston, in Northamptonshire, by whom he had four sons and
four daughters. She dying in 1642, he married secondly our
poet's grand-daughter, Mrs. Elizabeth Nash, on the 5th of June
1649, at Billesley in Warwickshire, about three miles from
Stratford-upon-Avon. If any of Shakspeare's manuscripts remained
in his grand-daughter's custody at the time of her second mar-
riage (and some letters at least she surely must have had), they
probably were then removed to the house of her new husband at
Abington. Sh- Hugh Clopton, who was born two years after her
death, mentioned to Mr. Macklin, in the year 1742, an old tra-
dition that she had carried away with her from Stratford many of
her grandfather's papers. On the death of Sir John Barnard
they must have fallen into the hands of Mr. Edward Bagley, Lady

624 STRATFORD REGISTER.

Mary, daughter of George Hart, was baptized March 31,
1671.

Barnard's executor ; and if any descendant of that gentleman be
now living, in his custody they probably remain.

Confiding in a pedigree transmitted by Mr. Whalley some
years ago to Mr. Steevens, I once supposed that Mr. Rowe was
inaccurate in saying that our poet's grand-daughter died without
issue. But he was certainly right ; and this lady was undoubtedly
the last lineal descendant of Shakspeare. There is no entry, as I
have already observed, in the register of Stratford^ of any issue of
hers by Mr. Nash; nor does he in his will mention any child,
devising the greater part of his property between his wife and his
kinsman, Edward Nash. That Lady Barnard had no issue by
her second husband, is proved by the register of Abington, in
which there is no entry of the baptism of any child of that mar-
riage, though there are regular entries of the time when the
several children of Sir John Barnard by his first wife were bap-
tized. Lady Barnard died at Abington, and was buried there on
the 17th of February, 1669-70; but her husband did not show his
respect for her memory by a monument, or even an inscription of
any kind. He seems not to have been sensible of the honourable
alliance he had made. Shakspeare's grand-daughter would not,
at this day, go to her grave without a memorial. By her last
will, which I subjoin, she directs her trustee to sell her estate of
New-place, &c. to the best bidder, and to offer it first to her
cousin Mr. Edward Nash. How she then came to have any pro-
perty in New-Place, which her first husband had devised to this
very Edward Nash, does not appear ; but I suppose that after the
death of Mr. Thomas Nash she exchanged the patrimonial lands
which he bequeathed to her, with Edward Nash and his son, and
took New-Place, &c. instead of them.

Sir John Barnard died at Abington, and was buried there on
March 5th, 1673-4. On his tomb-stone, in the chancel of the
church, is the following inscription :

*' Hie jacent exuviae generosissimi viri Johannis Bernard,
militis ; patre, avo, abavo, tritavo, aliisque progenitoribus per
ducentos et amplius annos hujus oppidi de Abingdon dominis, in-

STRATFORD REGISTER. 635

Thomas, son of George Hart, was baptized March 3,
1673 [1673-4].

signis : qui fate cessit undeseptuagesimo setatis suae anno, quinto
nonas Martii, annoque a partu B. Virginis, MDCLXXIII."

Sir John Barnard having made no will, administration of his
effects was granted on the 7th of November 1674-, to Henry-
Gilbert of Locko in the county of Derby, who had married his
daughter Elizabeth by his first wife, and to his two other surviv-
ing daughters ; Mary Higgs, widow of Thomas Higgs of Coles-
borne, Esq. and Eleanor Cotton, the wife of Samuel Cotton, Esq.
All Sir John Barnard's other children except the three above-
mentioned died without issue. I know not whether any descendant
of these be now living : but if that should be the case, among
their papers may probably be found some fragment or other rela-
tive to Shakspeare ; for by his grand-daughter's order, the admi-
nistrators of her husband were entitled to keep possession of her
house, &c. in Stratford, for six months after his death.

The following is a copy of the will of this last descendant of
our poet, extracted from the registry of the Prerogative Court of
Canterbury :

*' In the name of God, Amen. I Dame Elizabeth Barnard,
wife of Sir John Barnard of Abington in the county of Northamp-
ton, knight, being in perfect memory, (blessed be God !) and
mindful of mortality, do make this my last will and testament in
manner and form following :

" Whereas by my certain deed or writing under my hand and
seal, dated on or about the eighteenth day of April, 1653, accord-
ing to a power therein mentioned, I the said Elizabeth have
limited and disposed of all that my messuage with the appurte-
nances in Stratford-upon-Avon, in the county of Warwick, called
the New-place, and all that four-yard land and an half in Strat-
ford-Welcombe and Bishopton in the county of Warwick, (after
the decease of the said Sir John Barnard, and me the said Eliza-
beth,) unto Henry Smith of Stratford aforesaid, Gent, and Job
Dighton of the Middle Temple, London, Esq. since deceased,
and their heirs ; upon trust that they, and the survivor, and the
heirs of such survivor, should bargain and sell the same for the
best value they can get, and the money thereby to be raised to be
VOL. II. 2 S

626

STRATFORD REGISTER.

George, son of George Hart, was baptized August 20,
1676.

employed and disposed of to such person and persons, and in such
manner as I the said Elizabeth should by any writing or note
under my hand, truly testified, declare and nominate ; as thereby
may more fully appear. Now my will is, and I do hereby signify
and declare my mind and meaning to be, that the said Henry
Smith, my surviving trustee, or his heirs, shall with all conve-
nient speed after the decease of the said Sir John Barnard my
husband, make sale of the inheritance of all and singular the pre-
mises, and that my loving cousin Edward Nash, Esq. shall have
the first oft'er or refusal thereof, according to my promise formerly
made to him : and the monies to be raised by such sale I do give,
dispose of, and appoint the same to be paid and distributed, as is
herein after expressed ; that is to say, to my cousin Thomas
Welles of Carleton, in the county of Bedford, Gent, the sum of
fifty pounds, to be paid him within one year next after such sale :
and if the said Thomas Wells shall happen to die before such
time as his said legacy shall become due to him, then my desire
is, that my kinsman Edward Bagley, citizen of London, shall
have the sole beniefit thereof.

" Item, I do give and appoint unto Judith Hathaway, one of
the daughters of my kinsman Thomas Hathaway, late of Strat-
ford aforesaid, the annual sum of five pounds of lawful money of
England, to be paid unto her yearly and every year, from and
after the decease of the said survivor of the said Sir John Bar-
nard and me the said Elizabeth, for and during the natural life of
her the said Judith, at the two most usual feasts or days of pay-
ment in the year, videlicet, the feast of the annunciation of the
Blessed Virgin Mary, and Saint Michael the archangel, by equal
portions, the first payment thereof to begin at such of the said
feasts as shall next happen after the decease of the survivor of
the said Sir John Barnard and me the said Elizabeth, if the said
premises can be so soon sold ; or otherwise so soon as the same
can be sold : and if the said Judith shall happen to marry, and
shall be minded to release the said annual sum of five pounds, and
shall accordingly release and quit all her interest and right in
and to the same after it shall become due to her, then and in such

STRATFORD REGISTER.

627

Margaret Hart 9, widow, was buried Nov. 28, 1682.

case, I do give and appoint to her the sum of forty pounds in lieu
thereof, to be paid unto her at the time of the executing of such
release as aforesaid.

" Item, I give and appoint unto Joan the wife of Edward
Kent, and one other of the daughters of the said Thomas Hatha-
way, the sum of fifty pounds, to be likewise paid unto her within
one year next after the decease of the survivor of the said Sir
John Barnard and me the said Elizabeth, if the said premises can
be so soon sold, or otherwise so soon as the same can be sold ; and
if the said Joan shall happen to die before the said fifty pounds
shall be paid to her, then I do give and appoint the same unto
Edward Kent the younger, her son, to be paid unto him when he
shall attain the age of one-and-twenty years.

" Item, I do also give and appoint unto him the said Edward
Kent, son of the said John, the sum of thirty pounds, towards
putting him out as an apprentice, and to be paid and disposed of
to that use when he shall be fit for it.

*' Item, I do give or appoint and dispose of unto Rose, Eliza-
beth, and Susanna, three other of the daughters of my said kins-
man Thomas Hathaway, the sum of forty pounds a-piece, to be
paid unto every of them at such time and in such manner as the
said fifty pounds before appointed to the said Joan Kent, their
sister, shall become payable.

" Item, All the rest of the monies that shall be raised by such
sale as aforesaid, I give and dispose of unto my said kinsman
Edward Bagley, except five pounds only, which I give and appoint
to my said trustee Henry Smith for his pains ; and if the said
Edward Nash shall refuse the purchase of the said messuage and
four-yard land and a half with the appurtenances, then my will
and desire is, that the said Henry Smith or his heirs shall sell the
inheritance of the said premises and every part thereof unto the
said Edward Bagley, and that he shall purchase the same ; upon
this condition, nevertheless, that he the said Edward Bagley, his
heirs, executors, or administrators, shall justly and faithfully
perform my will and true meaning, in making due payment of all
the several sums of money or legacies before mentioned, in such
manner as aforesaid. And I do hereby declare my will and mean-

2 S 2

628 STRATFORD REGISTER.

Daniel Smith and Susanna Hart were married April 16,
1688.

ing to be that the executors or administrators of my said husband
Sir John Barnard shall have and enjoy the use and benefit of my
said house in Stratford, called the New-Place, with the orchards,
gardens, and all other the appurtenances thereto belonging, for
and during the space of six months next after the decease of him
the said Sir John Barnard.

" Item, I give and devise unto my kinsman, Thomas Hart, the
son of Thomas Hart, late of Stratford-upon-Avon aforesaid, all
that my other messuage or inn situate in Stratford-upon-Avon
aforesaid, commonly called the Maidenhead, with the appurte-
nances, and the next house thereunto adjoining, with the barn
belonging to the same, now or late in the occupation of Michael
Johnson or his assigns, with all and singular the appurtenances ;
to hold to him the said Thomas Hart the son, and the heirs of
his body ; and for default of such issue, I give and devise the
same to George Hart, brother of the said Thomas Hart, and to
the heirs of his body ; and for default of such issue to the right
heirs of me the said Elizabeth Barnard for ever.

*' Item, I do make, ordain, and appoint my said loving kinsman
Edward Bagley sole executor of this my last will and testament,
hereby revoking all former wills ; desiring him to see a just per-
formance hereof, according to my true intent and meaning. In
witness whereof I the said Elizabeth Barnard have hereunto set
my hand and seal, the nine-and-twentieth day of January, Anno
Domini, one thousand six hundred and sixty-nine.

*' Elizabeth Barnard.
*' Signed, sealed, published, and declared to be the last will
and testament of the said Elizabeth Barnard, in the presence of
'* John Howes, Rector de Abington.
" Francis Wickes.
" Probatum fuit testamentum suprascriptum apud aedes
Exonienses situat. in le Strand, in comitatu Middx.
quarto die mensis Martij, 1669, coram venerabili viro
Domino Egidio Sweete, milite et legum doctore, surro-
gato, &c. juramento Edwardi Bagley, unici executor,
nominat. cui, &c. de bene, &c. jurat."

STRATFORD REGISTER.

629

Shakspeare Hart was married to Anne Prew, April 10,
1694.

William Shakspeare, son of Shakspeare Hart, was bap-
tized Sept. 14, 1695.

Hester, wife of George Hart, was buried April 29, 1696.

Anne, daughter of Shakspeare and Anne Hart, was bap-
tized Aug. 9, 1700.

George, son of George and Mary Hart, was baptized Nov.
29, 1700.

George Hart^ was buried May 3, 1702.

Hester, Daughter of George Hart, was baptized Feb. 10,

1702 [1702-3].
Catharine, daughter of Shakspeare and Anne Hart, was

baptized July 19, 1703.
Mary, daughter of George Hart, was baptized Oct. 7,

1705.

Mary, wife of George Hart, was buried Oct. 7, 1705.
George Hart was married to Sarah Mountford, Feb. 20,
1728 [1728-9].

^ The eldest son of Joan Hart, our poet's sister. He was a
player, and, I believe, father to Charles Hart, the celebrated tra-
gedian. I have not found any entry in the register of the deaths
of his brothers Thomas and Michael Hart.

® This gentleman was born in 1587> and was brother to Thomas
Quiney, who married Shakspeare's youngest daughter. It does
not appear when Thomas Quiney died. There is a defect in the
register during the years 1642, 1643, and 1644; and another
lacuna from March 17, to Nov. 18, 1663. Our poet's son-in-
law probably died in the latter of those periods ; for his wife,
who died in Feb. 1661-2, in the register of burials for that year is
described thus : *' Judith, uxor Thomas Quiney." Had her
husband been then dead, she would have been denominated vidua.

9 Probably the wife of Thomas Hart, who must have been
married in or before the year 1633. The marriage ceremony was
not performed at Stratford, there being no entry of it in the
register.

* He was born in 1636.

630

STRATFORD REGISTER.

Thomas, son of George Hart, Jun. was baptized May 9,
1729.

Sarah, daughter of George Hart, was baptized Sept. 29,
1733.

Anne, daughter of Shakspeare Hart, was buried March
29, 1738.

Anne, daughter of George Hart, was baptized Sept. 29,
1740.

William Shakspeare, son of William Shakspeare Hart,

was baptized Jan. 8, 1743 [1743-4].
William Shakspeare, son of William Shakspeare Hart,

was buried March 8, 1744 [1744-5].
William, son of George Hart, was buried April 28, 1745.
George Hart 3 was buried Aug. 29, 1745.
Thomas, son of William Shakspeare Hart, was buried

March 12, 1746 [1746-7].
Shakspeare Hart'^ was buried July 7, 1747.
Catharine, daughter of William Shakspeare Hart, was

baptized May 10, 1748.
William Shakspeare Hart^ was buried Feb. 28, 1749

[1749-50].

The widow Hart ^ was buried July 10, 1753.
John, son of Thomas Hart, was baptized Aug. 18, 1755.
Anne, daughter of Shakspeare and Anne Hart, was buried
Feb. 5, 1760.

Frances, daughter of Thomas Hart, was baptized Aug. 8,
1760.

3 He was born in 1676, and was great grandson to Joan Hart.

4 He was born in 1666, and was also great grandson to Joan
Hart.

5 He was born in 1695.

^ This absurd mode of entry seems to have been adopted for
the purpose of concealment rather than information ; for by the
omission of the Christian name, it is impossible to ascertain from
the register who was meant. The person here described was, I
believe, Anne, the widow of Shakspeare Hart, who died in H^T.

STRATFORD REGISTER. 631

Thomas, son of Thomas Hart, was baptized Aug. 10,
1764.

Anne, daughter of Thomas Hart, was baptized Jan. 16,
1767.

Sarah, daughter of George Hart, was buried Sept. 10,
1768.

Frances, daughter of Thomas Hart, was buried Oct. 31,
1774.

George Hart 7 was buried July 8, 1778.

7 He was born in 1700.

EXTRACTS OF ENTRIES

ON THE

BOOKS OF THE STATIONERS' COMPANY.

N. B. The terms hooh and ballad were anciently used to signify
dramatick works, as well as any other forms of composition;
while tragedy and comedy were titles very often bestowed on
novels of the serious and the lighter kind. Steevens.

A Charter was granted to the Company of Stationers
on the 4th of May, 1556 (third and fourth of Philip and
Mary), and was confirmed by Queen Elizabeth in 1560.

The first volume of these Entries has been either lost
or destroyed, as the earliest now to be found is lettered
B 3. The hall was burnt down in the fire of London.
The entries began July 17, 1576.

1562.

[t Recevyd of M.Tottle for his licence forpryntinge
of the tragicall History of the Romeus
and Juliett with Sonnettes A. fol. 86. a 4.]

Again, Feb. 18, 1582 Vol.B.

M. TottelL] Romeo and Juletta 5 p. 193.

3 Since this was written, the first volume, marked A, has been
found. Malone.

4 This article, within crotchets, is from vol. i. which (as Mr.
Malone observes) has since been discovered. Steevens.

5 This and the foregoing are perhaps the original works on
which Shakspeare founded his play of Romeo and Juliet.

Steevens.

STATIONERS' REGISTERS. 633

Again, Aug. 5, 1596, — as a 7iewe ballad, for

Edward White C. p. 12. b.

April 3, 1592.
Edw. White.] The tragedy of Arden of Fever-
sham and Black Will^ 286

April 18, 1593.
Rich. Feild.] A booke entitled Venus and

Adonis 7 297 b.

Afterwards entered by Harrison,

sen. June 23, 1594 : by W.Leake, June 23,
1596: by W. Barrett, Feb. 16, 1616:
and by John Parker, March 8, 1619.

^ This play was reprinted in 1770 at Feversham, with a preface
attributing it to Shakspeare. The collection of parallel passages
which the editor has brought forward to justify his supposition, is
such as will make the reader smile. The following is a speci-
men :

Arden of Feversham, p. 74 :

** Fling down Endimion, and snatch him up,"
Merchant of Venice, Act V. Sc. I. :

" Peace, ho ! the moon sleeps with Endymion."
Arden of Feversham, p. 87 :

*' Let my death make amends for all my sin."
Much Ado About Nothing, Act IV. Sc. II. :

" Death is the fairest cover for her shame." Steevens.
' The last stanza of a poem entitled Mirrha the Mother of
Adonis ; or Lustes Prodegies, by William Barksted, 1607, has the
following praise of Shakspeare's Venus and Adonis :

" But stay, my muse, in thy own confines keepe,

" And wage not warre with so deere-lov'd a neighbor ;
" But, having sung thy day song, rest and sleepe,
" Preserve thy small fame and his greater favor.
" His song was worthie merit, (Shakspeare hee)
** Sung the faire blossome, thou the withered tree :
" Laurel is due to him ; his art and wit
Hath purchased it ; cypres thy brow will fit."

Steevens,

634

ENTRIES ON THE

Oct. 19, 1593.
Symon Waterson.] A booke entitled the Tragedye

of Cleopatra 8 301 b.

Feb. 6, 1593.
John Danter.] A booke entitled a noble Roman

Historye of Tytus Andronicus 304 b.

Entered also unto him by warrant
from Mr. Woodcock, the ballad thereof.

March 12, 1593.
Tho. Millington.] A booke intituled the Firste
Part of the Contention of the twoo
famous Houses of Yorke and Lancaster,
with the Deathe of the good Duke Hum-
phrey, and the Banishment and Deathe
of the Duke of Sufk, and the tragical
Ende of the prowd Cardinall of Win-
chester, with the notable Rebellion of
Jack Cade, and the Duke of York's first
Claime unto the Crown 305 b.

May 2, 1594.
Peter Shorte.] A plesant conceyted hystorie

called the Tayminge of a Shrowe^ 306 b.

May 9, 1594.
Mr. Harrison Sen.] A booke entitled the Ra-

vyshement of Lucrece 306 b.

* I suppose this to be Daniel's tragedy of Cleopatra. Simon
Waterson was one of the printers of his other works. Steevens.

Daniel's Cleopatra was published by Waterson in 1594? ; this
entry therefore undoubtedly related to it. Malone.

9 I conceive it to be the play that furnished Shakspeare with
the materials which he afterwards worked up into another with
the same title. Steevens.

STATIONERS' REGISTERS. 636

May 14, 1594.
Tho. Creede.] A booke intitled the famous Vic-
tories of Henrye the Ffyft, conteyninge
the honorable Battell of Agincourt . . 306 b.

May 14, 1594.
Edw. White.] A booke entituled the Moste fa-
mous Chronicle Historye of Leire Kinge
of England and his three Daughters ^ . . 307

May 22, 1594.
Edw. White.] A booke entituled a Wynters

Nightes Pastime ^ 307 b.

June 19, 1594.
Tho. Creede.] An enterlude intitled the Tragedie
of Richard the Third, wherein is showen
the Death of Edward the Fourthe, with
the Smotheringe of the twoo Princes in
the Tower, with a lamentable End of
Shore's Wife, and the Conjunction of
the twoo Houses of Lancaster and York 309 b.

* This might have been the very displeasing play mentioned
in the epilogue to the second part of King Henry IV. Steevens.

The earliest edition of this play now known to be extant, was
printed in 1598. Of that edition I have a copy. This piece fur-
nished Shakspeare with the outline of the two parts of King
Henry IV. as well as with that of King Henry V. Malone.

* I suppose this to be the play on the same subject as that of
our author, but written before it. Steevens.

3 Query if The Winter's Tale. Steevens.

4 This could not have been the work of Shakspeare, as the
death of Jane Shore makes no part of his drama. Steevens.

The play here entered, I believe to have been The true Tragedy
of Richard the Third, which will be found appended to Shak-
speare's drama in this edition. Boswell.

636

ENTRIES ON THE

July 20, 1594.
Tho. Creede.] The lamentable Tragedie of Lo-
crine, the eldest Sonne of K. Brutus,
discoursinge the Warres of the Britans,

&c 310 b.

Vol.C.

Before the beginning of this volume are placed
two leaves containing irregular entries, prohibi-
tions, notes, &c. Among these are the fol-
lowing :

Aug. 4th.

As You Like It, a book. -»
Henry the Fift, a book K >to be staied.

Comedy of Much Ado about Nothing. 3
The dates scattered over these pages are from
1596 to 1615.

Dec. 1, 1595.
Cuthbert Burby.] A book entituled Edward the
Third and the Black Prince, their Warres
with Kinge John of Fraunce ^ 6

Aug. 5, 1596.
Edw. White.] A newe ballad of Romeo and

Juliett? 12 b.

Aug. 15, 1597.
Rich. Jones.] Two ballads, beinge the ffirste and

5 Probably the play before that of Shakspeare. Steevens.

Surely this must have been Shakspeare's Henry V. which, as
well as Much Ado About Nothing, was printed in 1600, when
this entry appears to have been made. See the Essay on the
chronological order of Shakspeare's plays ; article. As You Like
It. Malone.

^ This is ascribed to Shakspeare by the compilers of ancient
catalogues. Steevens.

7 Query, if Shakspeare's play, the first edition of which ap-
peared in 1597. Steevens.

STATIONERS' REGISTERS. 637

second parts of the Widowe of Watling-
streete^ 22 b.

Aug. 29, 1597.
Andrew Wise.] The tragedye of Richard the

Seconde «... 23

Oct. 20, 1597.
Andrew Wise.] The tragedie of Kinge Richard
the Third, with the Death of the Duke
of Clarence 25

Feb. 25, 1597.
Andrew Wise.] A booke entitled the Historye
of Henry the Fourth, with his Battaile
at Shrewsburye against Henry Hott-
spurre of the Northe with the conceipted
Mirth of Sir John FalstalfFe 31

July 22, 1598.

James Robertes.] A booke of the Marchaunt of
Venyce, or otherwise called the Jewe of
Venyse. Provided that yt bee not prynted
by the said James Roberts or anye other
whatsoever, without lycence first had of
the right honourable the Lord Cham-
berlen 39 b.

Aug. 4, 1600.
As You Like It, a book. Henry the Ffift, a book.

Every Man in his Humour, a book. The
Comedie of Much Adoo about Nothinge,
a book.

^ Perhaps the songs on which the play with the same title was
founded. It may, however, be the play itself. It was not un-
common to divide one dramatick piece, though designed for a
single exhibition, into two parts. Seethe King John before that
of Shakspeare. Seeevens.

638 ENTRIES ON THE

Aug. 11, 1600.
Tho. Pavier.] First Part of the History of the
Life of Sir John Oldcastle Lord Cobham.

Item, The Second and last Parte of
the History of Sir John Oldcastell Lord

Cobham, with his Martyrdom 62

Aug. 14, 1600.
Tho, Pavyer.] The Historye of Henrye the Vth,

with the battel of Agencourt, &c 63

Aug. 23, 1600.
And. Wise, and Wm. Aspley.] Muche Adoe about

Nothinge 63 b.

Second Part of the History of King
Henry the Fourth, with the Humors of
Sir John FallstafF, written by Mr.
Shakespere ibid.

Oct. 8, 1600.
Tho. Fysher.] A booke called a Mydsomer Nyghte

Dreame 65 b.

Oct. 28, 1600.
Tho. Haies.l The book of the Merchant of

Venyce 66

Jan. 18, 1601.
John Busby.] An excellent and pleasant con-
ceited commedie of Sir John Faulstof

and the Merry Wyves of Windesor .... 78
Arth. Johnson.] The preceding entered as as-
signed to him from John Busby ibid.

April 19, 1602.

Tho. Pavier.] By Assignment from Tho. Mil-
lington. Salvo jure citjus cinnq. The
1st and 2d pts of Henry the VI. ii books.

Tho. Pavyer.] Titus and Andronicus 80 b.

STATIONERS' REGISTERS. 639

July 26, 1602.
James Roberts.] A booke The Revenge of
Hamlett prince of Denmarke, as yt was
latelie acted by the Lord Chamberlayn
his servantes 84 b.

Aug. 11, 1602.
Wm. Cotton.] A booke called the Lyfe and
Deathe of the Lord Cromwell, as yt was
lately acted by the Lord Chamberleyn
his servants 85 b.

Feb. 7, 1602.
Mr. Roberts.] The booke of Troilus and Cres-
seda, as yt is acted by my Lo. Cham-
berlen's men 91 b.

June 27, 1603.
Matt. Law.] Richard 3. -^v

Richard 2, i all kings.

Henry 4. 1st Part. J 98

Feb. 12, 1604.
Nath. Butter.] Yf he get good allowance for the
Enterlude of K. Henry 8, before he
begyn to print it ; and then procure the
warden's hands to it for the entrance of
yt, he is to have the same for his copy 9. 120

May 8, 1605.

Simon Stafford.] A booke called the tragicall
Historic of Kinge Leir and his three
Daughters, &c. as yt was latelie acted. 123

John Wright.] By assignment from Simon Staf-
ford and consent of Mr. Leake, the tra-

9 This was a play entitled, " When you see me you know me,
or the famous Chronicle Historie of King Henrie the Eight," &c.
by Samuel Rowley. Printed for N. Butter, 1605. Malone.

640

ENTRIES ON THE

gical History of King Leire, and his
three Daughters, provided that Simon
Stafford shall have the printing of this
book '

ibid.

July 3, 1605.
Tho. Pavyer.] A ballad of lamentable Murther
done in Yorkshire, by a Gent, upon two

Geo. Elde.] A booke called the Comedie of the

Aug. 6, 1607.
Tho. Thorp.] A comedie called What you Will 3 ibid.

Oct. 22, 1607.

Arth. Johnson.] The Merry Devil of Edmonton 159 b.

Nov. 19, 1607.
John Smythick.] A booke called Hamlett,
The Taminge of a Shrewe.

' This is the King Lear before that of Shakspeare. Steevens.
* Query, if the play. Steevens.

3 Perhaps this is Marston's comedy of What You Will. I have
a copy of it dated 1607. What You Will, however, is the second
title to Shakspeare's Twelfth -Night. Steevens,

This was certainly Marston's play, for it was printed in 1607, by
G. Eld, for T. Thorpe. Malone.

4 The Merry Devil of Edmonton is mentioned in the Blacke
Booke by T. M. 1604 : " Give him leave to see The Meriy Divel
of Edmunton, or A Woman Kill'd with Kindnesse." Steevens.

147

126

Puritan Wydovi^e

157 b.

STATIONERS' REGISTERS. 639
Romeo and Jiilett.

Love's Labour Lost 161

Nov. 26, 1607.

Nath. Butter and John Busby.] Mr. Willm.

Shakespeare, his Hystorye of Kinge
Lear, as yt was played before the King's
Majestie at Whitehall, upon St. Ste-
phen's night at Christmas last, by his
Majesties servants playing usually at
the Globe on the Bank-side 161 b.

April 5, 1608.
Joseph Hunt and Tho. Archer.] A book called
the Lyfe and Deathe of the Merry
Devill of Edmonton, with the pleasant
Pranks of Smugge the Smyth, Sir John,
and mine Hoste of the George, about
their stealing of Venison. By T. B. * . , 1 65 b.

May 2, 1608.
Mr. Pavyer.] A booke The Yorkshire Tragedy,

written by Wylliam Shakespere 167

May 20, 1608,
Edw. Blount.] The book of Pericles Prynce of

Tyre 167 b.

A book called Anthony and Cleopatra . . ibid.

Jan. 28, 1608,
Richard Bonion and Hen. Whalleys.] A booke
called the History of Troylus and Cres-
suda 178 b.

5 Bound up in a volume of plays attributed to Shakspeare, and
once belonging to King Charles II. but now in Mr. Garrick's
collection. The initial letters at the end of this entry, sufficiently
free Shakspeare from the charge of having been its author.

Steevens.

VOL. II. 2! T

640

ENTRIES ON THE

May 20, 1609.
Tho. Thorpe.] A booke called Shakespeare's

sonnetts 183 b.

Oct. 16, 1609.
Mr. Welby.] Edward the Third 189

Dec. 16, 1611.
John Brown.] A booke called the Lyfe and

Death of the Lo. Cromwell, by W. S. . . 214 b.

Nov. 29,1614.
John Beale.] A booke called the Hystory of
George Lord Faulconbridge, bastard
Sonne to Richard Cordelion ^ 256 b.

Feb. 16, 1616.
Mr. Barrett.] Life and Death of Lord Cromwell 279

March 2, 1617.
Mr. Snodham.] Edward the Third, the play 288

Sept. 17, 1618.
John Wright.] The comedy called Mucedorus 7 293 b.

July 8, 1619.
Lau. Hayes.] A play called the Merchant of

Venice 403

Vol. D.

Oct. 6, 162L
Tho. Walkely.] The tragedie of Othello the

Moore of Venice 21

® Query, if this was Shakspeare's King John, or some old
romance like that of Richard Coeur de Lion. Steevens.

It was undoubtedly The Famous Historic of George Lord Fau-
conbridge, a prose romance. I have an edition of it now before
me printed for I. B. dated 1616. Malone.

7 Bound up in a volume of plays attributed to Shakspeare, and
once belonging to King Charles the Second. See Mr. Garrick's
collection. Steevens.

STATIONERS' REGISTERS. 641

Comedyes.

Nov. 8, 1623.
Mr. Blounte and Isaak Jaggard.] Mr. William
Shakespeere's Comedyes, Histories, and
Tragedyes, soe many of the said Copies
as are not formerly entered to other
men.

Viz.

"The Tempest.
Two Gentlemen of Verona.
Measure for Measure.
The Comedy of Errors.
As You Like it.
Alls Well that Ends Well.
Twelfe Night.
^The Winter's Tale.
/-The Thirde Parte of Henry the
< Sixt.
V Henry the Eight.
rCoriolanus.

Timon of Athens.
J Julius Csesar.
i Mackbeth.

Anthonie and Cleopatra.

Cymbeline 69

Dec. 14, 1624.
Mr. Pavier.] Titus Andronnicus.

Widdow of Watling Street 93

Feb. 23, 1625.
Mr. Stansby.] Edward the Third, the play 115

April 3, 1626.
Mr. Parker.] Life and Death of Lord Cromwell 120

Aug. 4, 1626.
Edw. Brewster.] Mr. Pavier's right in Shake-
Rob. Birde. ] speare's plays, or any of them.

2 T 2

Histories.

Tragedies.

642

ENTRIES ON THE

The Historye of Hen. the fift, and the

play of the same.
Sir John Oldcastle, a play.
Tytus Andronicus, and
Hystorye of Hamblett 127

Jan. 29, 1629,
Mr. Meighen.] The Merry Wives of Winsor . . 193

Nov. 8, 1630.
Ric. Cotes.] Henrye the Fift.

Sir John Oldcastle.
Tytus Andronicus.
Yorke and Lancaster.
Agincourt.
Pericles.
Hamblet.

Yorkshire Tragedie 208

The sixteen plays in p. 641, were assigned by

Tho. Blount to Edward Allott, June 26, 1630 . . 109
Edward Allott was one of the publishers of the

second folio, 1632.

It has hitherto been usual to represent the ancient
quartos of our author as by far more incorrect than those
of his contemporaries ; but, I fear that this representation
has been continued by many of us, with a design to magnify
our own services, rather than to exhibit a true state of the
question. The reason why we have discovered a greater pro-
portion of errors in the former than in the latter, is because
we have sought after them with a greater degree of dili-
gence ; for let it be remembered, that it was no more the
practice of other writers than of Shakspeare, to correct the
press for themselves. Ben Jonson only (who, being
versed in the learned languages, had been taught the

STATIONERS' REGISTERS.

643

value of accuracy), appears to have superintended the
publication of his own dramatick pieces ; but were those
of Lyly, Chapman, Marlow, or the Heywoods, to be
revised with equal industry, an editor would meet with as
frequent opportunity for the exertion of his critical
abilities, as in these quartos which have been so repeatedly
censured by those who never took the pains to collate
them, or justify the many valuable readings they contain;
for when the character of them which we have handed
down, was originally given, among typographical blun-
ders, &c. were enumerated all terms and expressions
which were not strictly grammatical, or not easily under-
stood. As yet we had employed in our attempts at ex-
planation only such materials as casual reading had sup-
plied ; but how much more is requisite for the complete
explanation of an early writer, the last edition of the
Canterbury Tales of Chaucer may prove a sufficient
witness ; a work which in respect of accuracy and learn-
ing is without a rival, at least in any commentary on an
English poet. The reader will forgive me if I desert my
subject for a moment, while I express an ardent wish that
the same editor may find leisure and inclination to afford
us the means of reading the other works of the father of
our poetry, with advantages which we cannot derive from
the efforts of those who have less deeply and successfully
penetrated into the recesses of ancient Italian, French,
and English literature. — An author has received the
highest marks of distinction, when he has engaged the
services of such a commentator.

The reader may perhaps be desirous to know by whom
these quartos of Shakspeare are supposed to have been
sent into the world. To such a curiosity no very adequate
gratification can be afforded ; but yet it may be observed,
that as these elder copies possess many advantages over
those in the subsequent folio, we should decide perversely
were we to pronounce them spurious. They were in all

644

ENTRIES ON THE

probability issued out by some performer, who, deriving
no benefit from the theatre except his salary, was un-
interested in that retention of copies, which was the chief
concern of our ancient managers. We may suppose too
that there was nothing criminal in his proceeding ; as
some of the persons whose names appear before these
publications, are known to have filled the highest offices
in the company of Stationers with reputation, bequeath-
ing legacies of considerable value to it at their decease.
Neither do I discover why the first manuscripts delivered
by so careless a writer to the actors, should prove less
correct than those which he happened to leave behind
him, unprepared for the press, in the possession of the
same fraternity. On the contrary, after his plays had
passed for twenty years through the hands of a succession
of ignorant transcribers, they were more likely to become
maimed and corrupted, than when they were printed from
papers less remote from the originals. It is true that
Heminge and Condell have called these copies surrepti-
tious ^ but this was probably said with a view to enhance
the value of their own impression, as well as to revenge
themselves as far as possible on those who had in part
anticipated the publication of works from which they ex-
pected considerable gleanings of advantage, after their

first harvest on the stage was over. 1 mean to except

from this general character of the quartos, the author's
rough draughts of The Merry Wives of Windsor and
Romeo and Juliet; together with the play of King
Henry V. and the two parts of King Henry VI. ; for the
latter carry all the marks of having been imperfectly taken
down by the ear, without any assistance from the ori-
ginals belonging to the playhouses in which they were
first represented.

A succeeding table of those ancient copies of the plays
of Shakspeare which his commentators have really met
with and consulted, if compared with the earliest of these

STATIONERS' REGISTERS. 645

entries on the books already mentioned, may tempt the
reader to suppose that some quartos have not yet been
found, from which future assistance may be derived. But
I fear that no such resources remain ; as it seems to have
been the practice of the numerous theatres in the time of
Shakspeare, to cause some bookseller to make immediate
entries of their new pieces, as a security against the en-
croachments of their rivals, who always considered them-
selves as justified in the exhibition of such dramas as had
been enfranchised by the press. Imperfect copies, but for
these precautions, might have been more frequently ob-
tained from the repetition of hungry actors invited for
that purpose to a tavern ; or something like a play might
have been collected by attentive auditors, who made it
their business to attend succeeding representations with a
like designs. By these means, without any intent of
hasty publication, one company of players was studious
to prevent the trespasses of another 9. Nor did their
policy conclude here ; for I have not unfrequently met
with registers of both tragedies and comedies, of which
the titles were at some time to be declared. Thus,
July 26, 1576, John Hunter enters " A new and pleasant
comedie or plaie, after the manner of Common Condy-
cions; " and one Fielder, in Sept. 1581, prefers his right
to four others, " Whereof he will bring the titles." The
Famous Tragedy of the Rich Jewe of Malta, by Christo-
pher Marlow, is ascertained to be the property of Nich.
Ling and Tho. Millington, in May, 1594, though it was not
printed by Nich. Vavasour till 1633, as Tho. Hey wood,
who wrote the preface to it, informs us. In this manner
the contending theatres were prepared to assert a priority

^ See the notes of Mr. Collins and Mr. Malone at the end of
The Third Part of King Henry VI.

9 From the year 1570 to the year 1629, when the playhouse
in White Friars was finished, it appears that no less than seven-
teen theatres had been built.

646 ENTRIES ON STATIONERS' REGISTERS.

of title to any copies of dramatick performances ; and thus
were they assisted by our ancient stationers, who
strengthened every claim of literary property, by entries
secured in a manner which was then supposed to be obli-
gatory and legal.

I may add, that the difficulty of procuring licenses was
another reason why some theatrical publications were re-
tarded, and others entirely suppressed. As we cannot
now discover the motives which influenced the conduct of
former Lord Chamberlains and Bishops, who stopped the
sale of several works, which nevertheless have escaped
into the world, and appear to be of the most innocent
nature, we may be tempted to regard their severity as
rather dictated by jealousy and caprice, than by judgment
and impartiality. See a note on my Advertisement, vol. i.
p. 177.

The publick is now in possession of as accurate an
account of the dates, &c. of Shakspeare's works as perhaps
will ever be compiled. This was by far the most irksome
part of my undertaking, though facilitated as much as
possible by the kindness of Mr. Longman, of Pater-noster
Row, who readily furnished me with the three earliest
volumes of the records of the Stationers' Company, toge-
ther with accommodations which rendered the perusal of
them convenient to me, though troublesome to himself.

Steevens.

LIST OF THE
EARLY EDITIONS OF SHAKSPEARE

I. Richard II.

1. The Tragedie of King Richard the Second. As it
hath been publikely acted by the Right Honourable the
Lord Chamberlaine his Servants. Printed by Valentine
Simmes, for Andrew Wise, 1597.

2. The Tragedy of King Richard the Second, as it hath
beene publikely acted by the Right Honourable the Lord
Chamberlaine his Servants, by William Shake-speare, [the
same printer and publisher] , 1598.

3. The Tragedie of King Richard the Second, with
new Additions of the Parliament Sceane, and the de-
posing of King Richard. As it hath been lately acted
by the Kinges Servantes at the Globe. By William Shake-
speare. Printed by W. W. for Mathew Law, 1608 ^

4. Do. [Same Title.] Printed for Mathew Law, 1615.

* In the following- list of early quartos, I have omitted those
which appeared subsequently to the folio 1623, as they are ad-
mitted on all hands to be utterly worthless. The titles of the
others I have given at full length where there was any disagree-
ment among them, as far as I was enabled by Mr. Malone's
collection. Those to which I have not had access, I have copied
from Mr. Steevens's list, and marked them with an asterisk.

BoSWELL.

* This is the first edition in which the scene of Richard's depo-
sition was printed, and is the one which was followed by the folio
1623. Mr. Kemble has a copy [now in the possession of the
Duke of Devonshire], printed in 1608, in the title page of which
no mention is made of that additional scene, though found there,
and, except that variation in the title-page, is the very same as the
one described above. The words were probably thought offen-
sive by Mr. Tilney, the Master of the Revels, and ordered to be
omitted.— Afr. Malone's MS.

648 EARLY EDITIONS OF SHAKSPEARE.

II. Richard III,

1. The Tragedy of King Richard the Third. Con-
taining his treacherous Plots against his brother Cla-
rence : the pittieful Murther of his innocent Nephewes :
his tyrannical Usurpation : with the whole Course of his
detested Life, and most deserved Death. As it hath been
lately acted by the Right Honourable the Lord Cham-
berlaine his servants. Printed by Valentine Sims, for
William Wise, 1597.

^ 2. Do. William Shakspeare. Thomas Creede, for Wil-
liam Wise, 1598.

* 3. Do. William Shakspeare. Thomas Creede, for Wil-
liam Wise, 1602.

4. Do. [the same title as edit. 1597, except that it
describes this play, As it hath been lately acted by the
Kings Majesties Servants. Newly augmented. By William
Shake-speare "] . Printed by Thomas Creede, and are to
be sold by Mathew Lawe, 1612 or 1613, for the last
numeral is blurred in Mr. Malone's copy.

* 5. Do. William Shakspeare. Thomas Perfoote ; sold
by Mathew Lawe, 1622.

* 6. Do. William Shakspeare. John Norton; sold by
William Lawe, 1629.

7. Do. William Shakspeare. John Norton, 1629.

III. Romeo and Juliet.

1. An excellent conceited Tragedie of Romeo and
Juliet, As it hath been often (with great applause) plaid
publiquely, by the Right Honourable the Lord of
Hunsdon his Servants. Printed by John Danter, 1597.

2. The Most Excellent and lamentable Tragedie of
Romeo and Juliet. Newly corrected, augmented, and
amended. As it hath bene sundry times publiquely
acted, by the Right Honourable the Lord Chamberlaine
his Servants. Printed by Thomas Creede, for Cuthbert
Burby, 1599.

* 3. Do. for John Smithwicke, 1609.

EARLY EDITIONS OF SHAKSPEARE. 649

* 4. Do. Wm. Shakspeare, no date, John Smithwicke.

IV. Love's Labours Lost.
A Pleasant Conceited Comedie called. Love's Labours
Lost. As it was presented before her Highnes this last
Christmas. Newly corrected and augmented by W. Shake-
speare. Imprinted by W. W. for Cutberd Burby, 1598.

V. Henri/ IV. Part L

1. The History of Henrie the Fourth ; With the Battell
at Shrewsburie, betweene the King and Lord Henry
Percy surnamed Henrie Hotspur of the North. With
the humorous Conceits of Sir John Falstalfe. Printed
by P. S. for Andrew Wise, ]598^

2. [Same title as the preceding, except that these words,
newly corrected by W. Shakespeare," are added, and the

name of Hotspur is spelt Henry Percie, surnamed Henri/
Hotspur, and Falstaffe is put for Falstalfe.'] Printed by
S. S. for Andrew Wise, 1599.

3. Do. [Same title as 1599.] Printed by Valentine
Simmes, for Mathew Law, 1604.

^ 4. Do. For Mathew Law, 1608.

5. The History of Henrie the Fourth. With the Battell
at Shrewsburye betweene the Kinge and Lord Henrie
Percy, surnamed Henrie Hotspur of the North. With
the humorous Conceites of Sir John Falstaffe. Newly
corrected by W. Shake-speare. Printed by W. W. for
Mathew Law, 1613.

^ 6. Do. T. P. for Mathew Law, 1622.

VI. Henry IV. Part IL
1. The Second Part of Henrie the Fourth, continuing
to his Death, and Coronation of Henry the Fift. With the
Humors of Sir John Falstaffe, and swaggering Pistoll.
As it hath been sundrie times publikely acted by the
Right Honourable the Lord Chamberlaine his Servants.

^ This is not in Mr. Malone's collection, but the title is tran-
scribed from Mr. Capell's list. Bo swell.

650 EARLY EDITIONS OF SHAKSPEARE.

Written by William Shakspeare. Printed by V. S. for
Andrew Wise and William Aspley, 1600.

2. Do. 1600, do.

3. Do. 1600, do. 3

VII. Henry V.

1. The Chronicle History of Henry the Fift, with his
Battell fought at Agin Com't in Fraunce. Togither with
Auntient Pistolle. As it hath bene sundry times playd by
the Right Honorable the Lord Chamberlaine his Ser-
vants. Printed by Thomas Creede for Tho. Millington,
and John Busby, 1600.

* 2. Do. Thomas Creede, for Thomas Pavier, 1602.

3, Do. [Same title as the first, except that it has ancient,
not auntient PistolL] Printed for T. P. 1608.

VIII. Merchant of Venice.

1. The most excellent Historie of the Merchant of
Venice. With the extreme Crueltie of Shylocke the
Jewe towards the sayd Merchant, in cutting a just Pound
of his Flesh, and the obtayning of Portia by the Choyse
of three Chests. As it hath beene divers times acted by
the Lord Chamberlaine his Servants. Written by William
Shakespeare. Printed by J.R. for Thomas Heyes, 1600.

2. Do. [Same title as the preceding, except that it
omits to mention where it was performed, and has W.
not William Shakespeare.] Printed by J. Roberts.

IX. Midsummer-Night's Dream.
1. A Midsommer Nights Dreame. As it hath been

3 In Mr. Malone's collection there are two copies of this first
edition. In one of them he has the following note : *' In this
copy, signature E has only the ordinary quantity of leaves,
namely four. The publisher, finding he had omitted somewhat,
cancelled the two latter, (viz. E 3, and E 4), reprinted them in
a different manner, and added a fifth leaf in order to get in the
omitted lines. This is the only difference between the two
copies." The omission spoken of, is the whole of the first scene
of the third act. Boswell.

EARLY EDITIOINS OF SHAKSPEARE. 651

sundry times publickely acted, by the Right Honourable
the Lord Chamberlaine his Servants. Written by Wil-
liam Shakspeare. Imprinted for Thomas Fisher, 1600,

2. Do. [Same title as the preceding, except that it has
publikely not publickely acted.] Printed by James Roberts,
1600.

X. Much Ado About Nothing.

Much Adoe about Nothing. As it hath been sundrie
times publikely acted by the Right Honourable the
Lord Chamberlaine his Servants. Written by William
Shakespeare. Printed by V. J. for Andrew Wise and
William Aspley, 1600.

XI. Merry Wives of Windsor.

1. A most plesaunt and excellent conceited comedie,
of Syr John Falstaffe and the Merrie Wives of Windsor.
Entermixed with sundrie variable and pleasing Humors,
of Syr Hugh the Welch Knight, Justice Shallow, and
his wise Cousin M. Slender. With the swaggering vaine
of auncient Pistoll and Corporall Nym. By William
Shakespeare. As it hath bene divers times acted by
the Right Honorable my Lord Chamberlaines Servants.
Both before her Majestie and elsewhere. Printed by
T. C. for Arthur Johnson, 1602,

2. A most pleasant and excellent conceited comedy, of
Sir John Falstaffe, and the Merry Wives of Windsor.
With the swaggering vaine of ancient Pistoll, and Cor-
porall Nym. Written by W. Shakespeare. Printed for
Arthur Johnson, 1619.

XII. Hamlet.

1. The Tragicall Historie of Hamlet, Prince of Den-
marke. By William Shakespeare. Newly imprinted and
enlarged to almost as much againe as it was, according
to the true and perfect coppie. Printed by J. R. for N.
Landure, 16044.

4 This edition is not in Mr. Malone's collection, but I have
copied his transcript of the title. Boswell.

652 EARLY EDITIONS OF SHAKSPEARE.

^ 2. Do. William Shakespeare. J. R. for N. L. 1605.

3. The Tragedy of Hamlet Prince of Denmarke.
Newly imprinted and enlarged, according to the true and
perfect copy lastly printed. Printed by W. T. for John
Smithwicke, no date. [This edition of Hamlet was
printed, I believe, in 1607, as was also, I imagine, the
undated edition of Romeo and Juliet, for these two plays
were entered on the Stationers' books by John Smith-
wicke, Nov. 19, 1607. Malone.]

4. William Shakspeare. For John Smithwicke, 1609.

XIII. Lear,

1. M. William Shake-speare his True Chronicle His-
tory of the Life and Death of King Lear, and his three
Daughters. With the unfortunate Life of Edgar, Sonne
and Heire to the Earle of Glocester, and his sullen and
assumed Humour of Tom of Bedlam. As it was plaid
before the King's Majesty at White -Hall, uppon S.
Stephens Night; in Christmas Hollidaies. By his Ma-
jesties Servants playing usually at the Globe on the Banck-
side. Printed for Nathaniel Butter, and are to be sold
at his shop in Paul's Church-yard at the Signe of the
Pide Bull neere St. Austins Gate, 1608. [Begins at
Signature B.] ^

2. [Title and date the same as the preceding, excepting
that it is only said to be printed for Nathaniel Butter
without any mention of the place of sale, and begins at
Signature A .]

3. [Title the same as the two former, except that like
the first it begins at signature B : and like the second,
has no reference to the place of sale. All the three con-
tain different readings. Thus, the first reads, H 3, verso,
" my foote usurps my hody/^ the second H 2, " my foote
usurps my head;" and the third, H 3 verso, " a foole
usurps my bed"

5 In this copy the poet's name is spelt Shak-spearet without the
middle e. This is the only instance I have met with. Boswell.

EARLY EDITIONS OF SHAKSPEARE. 653

XIV. Troilus and Cressida.

1. The Famous Historic of Troylus and Cresseid.
Excellently expressing the beginning of their Lives, with
the conceited Wooing of Pandarus Prince of Lucia.
Written by William Shakespeare. Imprinted by G. Eld,
for R. Bonian and H. Walley, 1609.

2. [Same title as the former, but with this addition, " As
it was acted by the King's Majesty's Servants at the
Globe," and the word famous is omitted. In the former
also there is a preface in which the play is said to have
been never stal'd with the stage, which in this corrected
copy is omitted. It has been supposed that Mr. Pope
had an undated copy, but that is a mistake. Mr. Pope's
copy is in the possession of Mr. Kemble [the Duke of
Devonshire], and has the same date and the same book-
sellers' names. Malone.]

XV. Othello.

* 1. Othello, William Shakspeare. Thomas Walkely,
no date ^.

2. The Tragcedy of Othello, the Moore of Venice. As
it hath beene diverse times acted at the Globe and at the
Black-Friers, by his Majesties Servants. Written by
William Shakespeere. Printed by N. O. for Thomas
Walkley, 1622.

PLAYS

SUPPOSED TO HAVE BEEN

ALTERED BY SHAKSPEARE.

I. Titus Andronicus,

1. "The most lamentable Romaine Tragedie of Titus
Andronicus. As it hath sundry times been playde by the
Right Honourable the Earle of Pembrooke, the Earle of

^ Mr. Malone denied the existence of this edition. See Pre-
liminary Remarks to Othello, vol. ix. p. 215. Bos well.

654 PLAYS ALTERED BY SHAKSPEARE.

Darbie, the EarJe of Sussex, and the Lorde Chamber-
laine theyr Servants, At London, printed by J. R. for
Edward While, and are to bee solde at his shoppe, at
the little North doore of Poules, at the signe of the Gun,
1600.'^ Todd.

See vol. xxi. p. 260.

2. The most lamentable tragedie of Titus Andronicus.
As yt hath sundry times been plaide by the King's Ma-
jesties Servants. Printed for Edward White, 1611.

IL Pericles.

1. The late, and much admired play, called Pericles,
Prince of Tyre. With the true Relation of the whole
Historic, Adventures, and Fortunes, of the said Prince.
As also, the no less strange and worthy Accidents, in the
Birth and Life of his Daughter Marina. As it hath been
divers and sundry times acted by his Majesties Servants
at the Globe on the Banck-side. By William Shake-
speare. Imprinted for Henry Gosson, 1609.

2. The late, and much admired Play, called Pericles,
Prince of Tyre. With the true Relation of the whole
History, Adventures, and Fortunes, of the saide Prince.
Written by W. Shakespeare. Printed for T. P. 1619.

III. Henri/ VI. Part IL

1. The First Part of the Contention betwixt the two
famous Houses of York e and Lancaster, with the Death of
the good Duke Humphrey, and the Banishment and Death
of the Duke of Suffolke, and the Tragical End of the
proud Cardinall of Winchester, with the notable Rebel-
lion of Jack Cade, and the Duke of Yorkes first Claime
unto the Crowne. Printed by Thomas Creede for Thomas
Millington [date at the end of the play], 1594.

2. The First Part of the Contention betwixt the two
famous Houses of Yorke and Lancaster, with the Death
of the good Duke Humphrey : And the Banishment and
Death of the Duke of Suffolke, and the Tragicall End of

PLAYS ALTERED BY SHAKSPEARE. 655

the proud Cardinall of Winchester, with the notable
Rebellion of Jack Cade ; and the Duke of Yorkes first
Clayme to the Crowne. Printed by W. W. for Thomas
Millington, 1600. ,

Henry FJ. Part IIL

1. " The true tragedie of Richard Duke of Yorke, and
the Death of good King Henry the Sixt, with the whole
Contention betweene the two Houses Lancaster and Yorke,
as it was sundrie times acted by the Right Honourable the
Earle of Pembrooke his Seruants. Printed at London by
P. S. for Thomas Millington, and are to be sold at his
shoppe vnder St. Peters Church in Cornwal, 1595/'
8vo. (In Dr. Pegge's sale, and bought by Mr. Chalmers
for 5Z. 155. M.'')

2. [Same title as the preceding.] Printed by W. W.
for Thomas Millington, 1600.

Henrij VL Fart 11. and III. ^
The Whole Contention between the two Famous Houses
Lancaster and Yorke. With the Tragicall Ends of the
good Duke Humfrey, Richard Duke of Yorke and King
Henrie the Sixt. Divided into two Parts : And newly

^ This play, precisely the same with the 4to. of 1600, appears
as it was first altered by Shakspeare from the original drama of
Greene, Peele, and Marlowe ; great part of which is here pre-
served. He afterwards revised and improved it, as we have it in
the folio. RiTsoN.

Mr. Ritson was wrong in both of his positions. The
play in both of the editions which he mentions, does not
appear, as it was altered, but as the original before it was
altered by Shakspeare ; nor are they precisely the same ; for I
learn from Mr. Malone's collation that there are upwards of
thirty variations ; and in the elder copy, the metre is frequently
confounded by the end of one line being printed at the beginning
of another. Boswell.

VOL. II. 2 U

666

FOLIO EDITIONS

corrected and enlarged. Written by William Shakespeare,
Gent. Printed for T. P. no date \

FOLIO EDITIONS.

[Of all the remaining plays the most authentick edition
is the folio 1623 ; yet that of 1632 is not without value;
for though it be in some places more incorrectly printed
than the preceding one, it has likewise the advantage of
various readings, which are not merely such as reiteration
of copies will naturally produce. The curious examiner
of Shakspeare's text, who possesses the first of these,
ought not to be unfurnished with the second. As to the
third and fourth impressions (which include the seven re-
ject^^d plays) they are little better than waste paper, for
they differ only from the preceding ones by a larger accu-
mulation of errors. I had inadvertently given a similar
character of the folio 1632; but take this opportunity of
confessing a mistake into which I was led by too implicit
a reliance on the assertions of others. Steevens.

Enough has been already said on this question. Mr.
Steevens, I believe, stood nearly alone in the high
opinion he expressed of the second folio ; but the reader
may judge for himself from the perusal of the arguments
which have been brought forward by the two criticks in
their respective prefaces in 1790 and 1793. Mr. Malone
was of opinion that probably Thomas Randolph was the
person who superintended the publication of the second
folio. Randolph [as he observes] was born in 1600, and
consequently when he became a writer must have been some
years removed from the date of many of Shakspeare's earlier
plays. His Aristippus was printed for Robert Allot in

^ It was printed in 1619, as appears from an edition of Pericles,
printed by Pavier in that year [vide supra], the first sheet of which
begins with signature R ; the last sheet of this is Q. Malone.

OF SHAKSPEARE'S PLAYS.

657

1630, who would probably select a poet as the editor of
8hakspeare's works. It has been absurdly argued (says
Mr. Malone) " that the language could not have undergone
so great a change in nine years, that is from 1623 to 1632 ;
but this is a mis-statement. The question is not when
Shakspeare's plays were printed, but when they were
written. That alterations had taken place in the language
is evident from the alterations which were made by
D'Avenant in The Tempest and Macbeth from the sophis-
tications that are to be met with in the latter editions of
Spenser, from our author's own poems, and from almost
every work of that age which underwent several impres-
sions." BOSWELL.]

I. Mr. William Shakspeare's Comedies, Histories, and
Tragedies. Published according to the true original
Copies, 1 623, Fol. Printed at the Charges of W. Jag-
gard, Ed. Blount, J. Smethweeke, and W. Aspley 9.

The Dedication of the Players prefixed to the first folio y

1623.

To the most Noble and Incomparable Paire of Brethren,
William Earle of Pembroke, &c. Lord Chamberlaine
to the Kings most Excellent Majesty, and Philip
Earle of Montgomery, &c. Gentleman of his Majes-
ties Bed-chamber. Both Knights of the Most Noble
Order of the Garter, and our singular good Lords.

Right Honourable,

Whilst we studie to be thankful in our particular, for
the many favors we have received from your L. L. we are

9 It seems, from such a partnership, that no single publisher
was at that time willing to risk his money on a complete col-
lection of our author's plays. Steevens.

It rather arose from several of these booksellers having a pro-
perty in the quarto plays which were here reprinted. Malone.

2 U 2!

658

FOLIO EDITIONS

falne upon the ill fortune, to mingle two the most diverse
things that can bee, feare, and rashnesse ; rashnesse in

Every possible adulteration has of late years been practised in
fitting up copies of this book for sale.

When leaves have been wanting, they have been reprinted
with battered types, and foisted into vacancies, without notice
of such defects and the remedies applied to them.

When the title has been lost, a spurious one has been fabri-
cated, with a blank space left for the head of Shakspeare, after-
wards added from the second, third, or fourth impression. To
conceal these frauds, thick vermillion lines have been usually
drawn over the edges of the engravings, which would otherwise
have betrayed themselves when let into a supplemental page,
however craftily it was lined at the back, and discoloured with
tobacco-water till it had assumed iheixxxtjaune antique.

Sometimes leaves have been inserted from the second folio,
and, in a known instance, the entire play of Cymbeline ; the
genuine date at the end of it [1632] having been altered into
1623.

Since it was thought advantageous to adopt such contrivances
while the book was only valued at six or seven guineas, now it has
reached its present enormous price, may not artifice be still more
on the stretch to vamp up copies for the benefit of future cata-
logues and auctions? — Shakspeare might say of those who profit
by him, what Antony has observed of Enobarbus —

my fortunes have

" Corrupted honest men."

Mr. Garrick, about forty years ago, paid only 1/. 16^. to Mr.
Payne at the Mews Gate for a fine copy of this folio. — After the
death of our Roscius, it should have accompanied his collection
of old plays lo the British Museum ; but had been taken out of
his library, and has not been heard of since.

Here I might particularize above twenty other copies; but as
their description would not always meet the wishes or interests of
their owners, it may be as well omitted.

Perhaps the original impression of the book did not amount to
more than 250 ; and we may suppose that different fires in Lon-
don had their share of them. Before the year 1649 they were

OF SHAKSPEARFS PLAYS.

659

the enterprize, and feare of the successe. For, when we
valew the places your H. H. sustaine, we cannot but

so scarce, that (as Mr. Malone has observed) King Charles I. was
obliged to content himself with a folio of 1632, at present in my
possession.

Of all volumes, those of popular entertainment are soonest
injured. It would be difficult to name four folios that are oftener
found in dirty and mutilated condition, than this first assemblage
of Shakspeare's plays — God's Revenge against Murder — The
Gentleman's Recreation — and Johnson's Lives of the Highway-
men.

Though Shakspeare was not, like Fox the Martyrologist, de-
posited in churches, to be thumbed by the congregation, he
generally took post on our hall tables ; and that a multitude of
his pages have " their effect of gravy," may be imputed to the
various eatables set out every morning on the same boards. It
should seem that most of his readers were so chary of their time,
that (like Pistol^ who gnaws his leek and swears all the while)
they fed and studied at the same instant. I have repeatedly met
with thin flakes of piecrust between the leaves of our author.
These unctuous fragments, remaining long in close confinement,
communicated their grease to several pages deep on each side of
them. It is easy enough to conceive how such accidents might
happen ; — how aunt Bridget's mastication might be disordered at
the sudden entry of the Ghost into the Queen's closet, and how
the half-chewed morsel dropped out of the gaping 'Squire's mouth,
when the visionary Banquo seated himself in the chair of Mac-
beth. Still, it is no small eulogium on Shakspeare, that his
claims were more forcible than those of hunger. — Most of the
first folios now extant, are known to have belonged to ancient
families resident in the country.

Since our breakfasts have become less gross, our favourite au-
thors have escaped with fewer injuries; not that (as a very nice
friend of mine observes) those who read with a coffee-cup in their
hands, are to be numbered among the contributors to bibliothecal
purity.

I claim the merit of being the first commentator on Shakspeare
who strove, with becoming seriousness, to account for the frequent
stains that disgrace the earliest folio edition of his plays, wliich is

1660

FOLIO EDITIONS

know their dignity greater, then to descend to the reading
of these trifles : and, while we name them trifles, we have
deprived ourselves of the defence of our Dedication.
But since your L. L. have been pleas'd to thinke these
trifles some-thing, heeretofore ; and have prosequuted both
them, and their Authour living, with so much favour : we
hope that (they out-living him, and he not having the fate,
common with some, to be exequutor to his owne writings)
you will use the same indulgence toward them, you have
done unto their parent. There is a great difference, whe-
ther any booke choose his Patrones, or finde them : This,
liath done both. For, so much were your L. L. likings of
the severall parts, when they were acted, as before they
were published, the Volume ask'd to be yours. We have
but collected them, and done an office to the dead, to
procure his Orphanes, Guardians ; without ambition either
of selfe-profit, or fame : onely to keepe the memory of so
worthy a Friend, and Fellow alive, as was our Shake-
speare, by humble offer of his playes, to your most
noble patronage. ^ Wherein, as we have justly observed,
no man to come neere your L. L. but with a kind of reli-
gious addresse, it hath bin the height of our care, who
are the Presenters, to make the present worthy of your
H. H. by the perfection. But, there we must also crave
our abilities to be considered, my Lords. W^e cannot go

now become the most expensive single book in our language ; for
what other English volume without plates, and printed since the
year 1600, is known to have sold, more than once, for thirty-five
pounds, fourteen shillings ? Steevens.

It has become still more expensive. Ipse miserrimus gave a
much larger sum at Mr. Kemble's sale ; but I could not bring
myself to a cold calculation of the value of a copy which was at
once a memorial of Shakspeare and of Kemble. Bos well.

' If any thing is gained by preserving the old spelling in
Heminge and Condell's dedication and preface, it should be
strictly adhered to. It has hitherto been printed, but not cor-
rectly, from the second folio. Boswell.

OF SHAKSPEARFS PLAYS. 661

beyond our owne powers. Country hands reach foorth
milke, creame, fruites, or what they have : and many
Nations (we have heard) that had notgummes and incense,
obtained their requests with a leavened Cake ^. It was no
fault to approch their Gods by what meanes they could •
And the most, though meanest, of things are made more
precious, when they are dedicated to Temples. In that
name therefore, we most humbly consecrate to your
H. H. these remaines of your servant Shakespeare ;
that what delight is in them may be ever your L. L. the
reputation his, and the faults ours, if any be committed,
by a payre so carefull to shew their gratitude both to the
living, and the dead, as is

Your Lordshippes most bounden,
John Heminge,
Henry Condell.

The Preface of the Players. Prefixed to the first folio
edition published in 1623.

To the great variety of Readers,
From the most able, to him that can but spell : there
you are numbered. We had rather you were weighed.
Especially, when the fate of all Bookes depends upon
your capacities : and not of your heads alone, but of

your purses. Well ! it is now publique, and you wil

* Country hands reach forth milk, &c. and many nations — that
had not gumnies and incense, obtained their requests with a
leavened Cake.] This seems to have been one of the com-
mon-places of dedication in Shakspeare's age. We find it in
Morley's Dedication of a Book of Songs to Sir Robert Cecil,
1595 : " I have presumed" (says he) *'to make offer of these sim-
ple compositions of mine, imitating (right honourable) in this the
customs of the old world, who wanting incense to offer up to their
gods, made shift insteade thereof to honour them with milk.'' The
same thought (if 1 recollect right) is again employed by the
players in their dedication of Fletcher's plays, folio,

Malone.

662

FOLIO EDITIONS

stand for your priviledges wee know : to read, and cen-
sure. Do so, but buy it first. That doth best commend
a Booke, the Stationer saies. Then, how odde soever
your brainesbe, or your wisedomes, make your licence the
same, and spare not. Judge your sixe-pen'orth, your shil-
lings worth, your five shillings worth at a time, or higher,
so you rise to the just rates, and welcome. But, whatever
you do. Buy. Censure will not drive a Trade, or make
the Jacke go. And though you be a Magistrate of wit,
and sit on the Stage at Black-Friers, or the Cock-pit, to
arraigne Playes dailie, know, these Playes have had
their triall alreadie, and stood out all Appeales ; and do
now come forth quitted rather by a Decree of Court, than
any purchas'd Letters of commendation.

It had bene a thing, we confesse, worthie to have bene
wished, that the Author himselfe had lived to have set
forth, and overseen his owne writings ; But since it hath
bin ordain'd otherwise, and he by death departed from that
right, we pray you, doe not envie his Friends, the office
of their care and paine, to have collected and published
them ; and so to have publish'd them, as where 3 (before)
you were abus'd with divers stolne, and surreptitious copies,
maimed and deformed by the frauds and stealthes of
injurious impostors, that expos'd them : even those are
now offer'd to your view curM, and perfect of their
limbes ; and all the rest, absolute in their numbers, as he
conceived the : Who, as he was a happie imitator of
Nature, was a most gentle expresser of it. His mind
and hand went together : and what he thought, he uttered
with that easinesse, that wee have scarse received from
him a blot in his papers. But it is not our province, who
onely gather his works, and give them you, to praise him.
It is yours that reade him. And there we hope, to your
divers capacities, you will finde enough, both to draw,
and hold you : for his wit can no more lie hid, then it

3 — as WHERE — ] i. e. whereas. Malone.

OF SHAKSPEARE'S PLAYS. 663

could be lost. Reade him, therefore ; and againe, and
againe ; And if then you doe not like him, surely you are
in some manifest danger, not to understand him. And so
we leave you to other of his Friends, whom if you need,
can bee your guides : if you neede them not, you can
leade yourselves, and others. And such readers we wish
him.

John Heminge,
Henrie Condell.

After the publication of my first edition of Shakspeare's
works, a notion struck me, that the preface prefixed by
the players, in 1623, to their edition of his plays, had much
of the manner of Ben Jonson ; and an attentive compari-
son of that preface with various passages in Jonson's
writings having abundantly supported and confirmed my
conjecture, 1 do not hesitate now to assert that the
greater part of it was written by him. Hemings and
Condell being themselves wholly unused to composition,
and having been furnished by Jonson, whose reputation
was then at the height, with a copy of verses in praise of
Shakspeare, and with others on the engraved portrait pre-
fixed to his plays, would naturally apply to him for assist-
ance in that part of the work in which they were, for the
first time, to address the publick in their own names.
Whatever, therefore, occurred to them on this subject,
they submitted, I imagine, to Jonson's revision ; and, not
approving of their performance, I conceive, he wrote the
greater part of it anew : at least, I think I can show the
whole of the first member of this address, comprising
eighteen lines out of forty, to be entirely his ; and though
in the remainder he did not, I believe, proceed as in the
former part, una litura, yet his revising hand may be traced
there also. This production has already been laid before
the reader at length ; I shall now decompose it, by sub-
mitting each member of it separately to his view ; and a
minute comparison of the first half of this preface with

664

FOLIO EDITIONS

various passages in Jonson's works, will, I conceive,
establish my hypothesis beyond a doubt. The only in-
dulgence I claim is, that the reader will not too hastily
pronounce this or the other passage to contain only a
fanciful resemblance, nor form his judgment till he has
examined the whole of this paper ; remembering always
that other writers beside Jonson have frequently repeated
themselves.

The Players'' Preface to their
Edition of Shakspeare.

The Address subscribed with the
names of Hemings and Condell,
begins thus :

1. "To the great varieti/o( Readers.

" Frona the most able, to him
that can but spell —

Corresponding Passages in Jonson's
Works.

1. In like manner we find pre-
fixed to Catiline, in 1611, two Ad-
dresses :

To the Reader in ordinary —
"To the Reader extraordinary/ — "
or in other words, —
" To the great variety/ of Readers."

The reader extraordinary is, in
the corresponding passage, " the
most able ; " " the reader in ordi-
nary," he " that can but spell/'

So also, in the Preface to the
New Inn, a comedy, by Ben Jon-
son, acted in 1629, and printed in
1631 :

" To the Reader.
" If thou beest such [i. e. if thou
can'st indeed read], I make thee
my patron, and dedicate my work
to thee. If not so much, would
that I had been at the charge of
thy better literature. Howsoever,
if thou can'st but spell, and join my
sense, there is more hope of thee,
than a hundred fastidious imperti-
nents."

2. " there you are num-
bered; we had rather you were
weighed.''

2. " Suffrages in parliament are
numbered, not weighed " (Disco-
veries, by Ben Jonson, written
after 1630.)

OF SHAKSPEARE'S PLAYS. 665

The Players* Preface to their
Edition of Shakspeare.

3. *' Especially when the fate of
all books depends on your capa-
cities and not of your heads alone,
but of your purses. Well! it is
now publique, and you will stand
for your privileges, we know, — to
read and censure. Do so ; but
hui/ it first : that doth best commend
a hook, the stationer says^

Corresponding Passages in Jonson's
Works.

Or, in other language, the ques-
tion is carried by the tale or num-
ber, not the weight or respecta-
bility of the voters.

3. " Well ! my modesty shall
sit down and let the world call it
guilt or what it will," &c. (Letter
from Ben Jonson to Toby Ma-
thews.)

This is merely noticed for the
purpose of marking Jonson's ordi-
nary phraseology. The parallelism
is found in different parts of Jon-
son's works. Thus, in his 131st
Epigram, 1616, we find :
*' When we do give, Alphonso, to
the light

" A worke of ours, we part with

our own right ;
" For then all mouthes will judge,

" and their own way ;
" The learn'd have no more privi-
lege than the lay :
" And though we could all men,
all censures heare," &c.
And in his third Epigram, we
have —

" To my Bookseller.
" Thou that mak'st gain thy end,
and wisely well
CaWst a hook good or had, as it
doth sell ;
*' Use mine so too."

It should be remembered that
in the two passages here compared,
stationer and bookseller have
the same meaning; these two
words being synonymous during
Jonson's life-time.

FOLIO EDITIONS

666

The Players' Preface to their
Edition of Shakspeare.

4. " Then, hozv odde soever
[i. e. how unequal soever] i/our
braines be or your wisdomes, make
your license the same, and spare
not/'

[The word odd being here used
in its original sense, as opposed to
that which is even or equal, has not
hitherto, I believe, been generally
understood ; being now commonly
used in the sense of singular, ex-
traordinary, or whimsical. The
context in the corresponding pas-
sage decisively ascertains its mean-
ing here.]

5. " Judge your sixe-pen'orth,
your shillings worth, your Jive shil-
lings zvorth at a time, or higher, so
you rise to the just rates and wel-
come. But, whatsoever you do,
buy. Censure will not drive a
trade —

[In the corresponding passage in
Bartholomew Fair, the words, " it
shall be lawfull for any man to
judge his sixe-pen'orth,'^ &c. are
perfectly clear, each person being
allowed to censure according to
the price he had paid for his place
in the playhouse, from sixpence to
half a crown, which was then the
highest rate. But as applied to
the purchasers of the folio edition
of our author's plays, they are

Corresponding Passages in J onson''s
Works.

4. So, in the Discoveries:

" Suffrages in parliament are
numbered, not weighed ; nor can it
be otherwise in those publique
councels where nothing is so un-
equal as the equality; for there,
how odde soever mens braines or
wisdomes are, their power is always
even and the same."

In the preface to Catiline, 1611,
he again alludes to the general
claim to judging and censuring,
however unqualified the reader
may be :

" Would I had deserved but
half so well of it in translation, as
that ought to deserve of you in
judgment, if you have any. I know
you will pretend, whosoever you
are, to have that and more ; but all
pretensions are not just claims."

5. So, in the Induction to Bar-
tholomew Fair, acted in 1614 :

" It is further agreed that every
person here have his free will of
censure. .. .It shall be lawful for
any man to judge his sixe-pen'orth,
his twelve pen^orth, so to his eigh-
teen pence, tzco shillings, and half
a crowne, to the value of his place,
provided alwaies his place get not
above his wit. . . .He shall put in
for censures here, as they do for
lots in the lottery : marry, if he
drop but sixe-pence at the doore,
and will censure a crozvnes worth,
it is thought there is no conscience
or justice in that."

Again, in The Magnetick Lady,
acted in 1632:

OF SHAKSPEARE'S PLAYS. 667

The Players' Preface to their
Edition of Shakspeare.

liable to some objection; for no
one could buy sixpen'orth, or
five shillings worth of that book :
he must purchase the whole vo-
lume, which was probably sold for
twenty shillings, or none. The
same train of thought occurring to
old Ben in both cases, he appears,
therefore, to have introduced it
here with somewhat less propriety.
Having been in the habit of fre-
quently using this language to the
various spectators of a play, paying
various prices for their amusement,
he could not refrain from address-
ing the readers of one in the same
way. — ^The passage, however, with
some indulgence, may admit of this
interpretation : ' If you do but rise
to the just rates, that is, if you
do but purchase the book, you may
read it at your leisure, and pass
your sentence on six-pen'orth of it
at one time, a shilling's worth at
another time, and five shillings'
worth at another; just as your
fancy may direct, till you have
perused the whole volume/

Corresponding Passages in Jonsoh's
Works.

" Dam-play. I see no reason, if
I come here and pay my eighteen
pence or two shillings for my seat,
but I should take it out in censure
on the stage.

Boy, Your two shillings worth
is allowed you; but you will take
your ten shillings worth, your
twenty shillings worth, and more."

6. And though you be a Ma-
gistrate of wit, and sit on the stage
at Blackfriers or the Cockpit, to
arraigne playes dailie, know, these
playes have had their triall alrea-
die, and stood out all appeals."

6. So, in The Magnetick Lady:

" if I can but hold them all

together,. . . .
I shall have just reason to be-
lieve

*' My wit is magisterial.^'
Again, ibid. :

" And therefore, Mr. Damplay,
unless like a solemn justice of wit,
you will damn our play unheard
and unexamined,"

Of this notion Jonson was so

668

FOLIO EDITIONS

2'he. Players" Preface to their
Edition of Shakspeare.

Corresponding Passages in Jonsori's
Works.

fond, that he has repeated it no
less than six times. Thus, in the
Induction to Bartholonrjew-Fair,
l6l4:

" It is also agreed, that every
man here exercise his own judg-
ment, and not censure by contagion,
or upon trust from another's voice
or face that sits by him, be he never
so first in the commission of wit ; as
also that he be fixd and settled in
his censure; that what he ap-
proves or not approves to-day, he
will do the same to-morrow, and if
to-morrow, the next day (if need
be), and not to be brought about
by any that sit on the bench with
him, though they indite and ar-
raigne plaies dailie."

Again, in the Induction to the
Staple of Newes, acted in 1625:

" But what will the noblemen
thinke, or the grave wits, to see
you seated on the bench, thus ? "

[The bench is used metaphori-
cally, and means here, and in the
foregoing passage, the judicial
bench of zvit, as appears from
several other places.]

Again, ibid. :

" such as had a longing to

see plays and sit upon them, as we
do, and arraigne both them and
their poets."

Again, in the same play :

" he is the very justice o'

peace o' the play, and can commit
whom he will and what he will,
errour, absurdity, as the toy takes
him."

Again, ibid. :

OF SHAKSPEARFS PLAYS. 669

The Players,'' Preface to their
Edition of Shakspeare.

Corresponding Passages in Jonson's
Works.

" It was a plain piece of political
incest, and worthy to be brought
afore the high commission of wit J*

See also Jonson's Ode on his
New Inn being damned, 8vo.
1631:

Come leave the loathed stage.
And the more loathsome age,
Where pride and impudence, in
faction knit,
" Usurp the chair of wit ;
Indicting and arraigning every
day

" Something they call a play ;
" Let their fastidious, vaine,
" Commission of the hraine
" Run on and rage, sweat, censure

and condemn,
" They were not made for thee,

less then for them."
Again, in Jonson's verses to
Fletcher on his Faithful Shep-
herdess :

" The wise and many-headed

bench that sits
" Upon the life and death of plays

and wits,
" Composed of gamester, captain,

knight, knight's man,
" Lady, or pusil, that weares

maske or fan.
Velvet or tafata cap, rank'd in

the dark,
" With the shop's foreman or some

such brave sparke,
" That may judge for his sixpence,

before

" They saw it halfe, damn'd thy
whole play and more."

7. " You will stand for your

7. So, in The Magnetick Lady:

FOLIO EDITIONS

670

The Players' Preface to their
Edition of Shakspeare.

privilegesy we know, to read and

censure These playes have had

their triall alreadie and stood out
all appeales ; and do now come
forth quitted rather by a decree of
court then any purchased letters of
recommendation.^*

Corresponding Passages in Jonson's
Works,

" I care not for marking of the

play I'll damn it, talk and

do that I come for. I will not have
gentlemen lose their privilege, nor
I my prerogative for ne'er an over-
grown or superannuated poet of
them all. I will censure and be
witty,. ... and enjoy my magna
charta of reprehension as my pre-
decessors have done before me."

In the Dedication of The Silent
Woman, folio, 1616, we find the
following passage :

" This makes that I now num-
ber you, not only in the name of
favour, but the name of justice to
what I write, and doe presently call
you to the exercise of that noblest
and manliest virtue ; as courting
rather to be freed in my fame by
the authority of a judge, then the
credit of an undertaker."

[As " the authority of a judge"
here stands in the place of a " de-
cree of court," in the correspond-
ing passage, so the words — " the
credit of an undertaker," repre-
sent " any purchased letters of re-
commendation ; " an undertaker,
in Jonson's time, signifying * a
friend who sides or joins with an-
other in any cause ; a maintainer
or partisan.']

Quitted, not acquitted, was
Jonson's phraseology. So, in The
Alchemist, 1610:

*^ Yet I put my life

" On you that are my country, and

this pelfe
" Which I have got, if you do quit

me, rests,
" To feast you often."

OF SHAKSPEARFS PLAYS. 671

The Players' Preface to their
Edition of Shakspeare.

8. " But since it hath been or-
dained otherwise, and he by death
departed from that right —

9. " — we pray you do not
envy his friends the office of their
care and paine to have collected
and published them " (the writ-
ings of Shakspeare).

Vol. II

Corresponding Passages in Jonson^s
Works.

8. " It is further agreed that
every person here has his or their

free will of censure, the author

having now departed with his
right — (Induction to Bartho-
lomew Fair, 1614.)

So also, in The Devil's an Ass,
1616 :

" — that time is yours,

Ml/ right I have departed
with — "

Again, in the address to the ordi-
nary Reader^ prefixed to Catiline,
1611 :

" It is your own ; I departed
with my right when I let it first
abroad."

So again, in his 131st Epigram :
" When we do give, Alphonso, to

the light,
" A work of ours, we part zvith our
own right.'^

Though these passages relate to
the departing with a right, in a
loss hy publication, and in the cor-
responding passage, by death, yet
the expression is nearly the same :
and these passages, at least, show
how often Jonson repeated the
same thought.

9. In this phraseology there ap-
pears somewhat of a Latin air :
" Do not envy his friends the office
of publishing them^^ or, " do not
envy his friends their care and pain
in publishing," would have been, I
think, the language of men who
merely wished to make themselves
understood ; but " the office of
their care " is scarcely intelligible,

FOLIO EDITIONS

672

The Players^ Preface to their
Edition of Shakspeare,

10. " — and so to have pub-
lished them, as where [whereas],
before, you were abased with
diverse stolne and surreptitious
copies, maimed and deformed by
the stealth of injurious impostors,
that exposed them ; even those are
now offered to your view, cured
and perfect of their limbs, and all
the rest absolute in their numherSy
as he conceived them."

Corresponding Passages in Jonson*s
Works.

unless office were used in the sense
of duty, as certainly it was in this
instance. So, in Catiline :

I must with offices and patience
win him."

On so slight a circumstance
little reliance could be placed,
were it not corroborated by more
decisive proofs. However, I may
mention that in The Discoveries
we find —

" I have ever observed it to have
been the office of a wise patriot
among the greatest affairs of the
state to take care of the conmion-
wealth of learning."

10. So, in Every Man in his
Humour :

" — and though that in him this
kind of poem appeared absolute and
fully perfected — ."

Again, in the Address to the
Reader, prefixed to Sejanus, 4to.
1605 :

" Lastly I would inform you
that this book in all numbers is not
the same with that which was
acted on the publick stage."

Again, in the Dedication of
Jonson's Epigrams to Lord Pem-
broke, 1616:

" — or if all answere not in all
numbers the pictures I have made
of them, I hope it will be forgiven
me,. . . . that they are no ill pieces,
though they be not like the per-
sons."

Again, in the Epilogue to The
New Inn, 1631 [he is speaking of
his plays] :

OF SHAKSPEARE'S PLAYS. 673

Players' Preface to their Corresponding Passages in Jonsoh's
Edition of Shakspeare. fVorks.

" — But do him right ;

" He meant to please you, for he

sent things fit
" In all the numbers both of sense
and wit."
Again, in his Underwoods :
" Eupheme, or the fair fame
left to posteritie of that truly noble
lady, the lady Venetia Digby late
wife of Sir Kenelm Digby, Knight,
a gentleman absolute in all num-
bers:'

Again, in his Discoveries :
" But his learned and able
though unfortunate successor is he,
who hnth Jiird up all numbers^ and
performed that in our tongue which
may be compared or preferred
either to insolent Greece or
haughty Rome."

Again, in his 95th Epigram :
I should believe the soule of
Tacitus

" In thee, most worthie Savile,

liv'd to us;
" So hast thou render'd him in all

his bounds,
" And all his numbers both of

sense and sounds."
" Absolute in their numbers " is
a pure Latinism, — omnibus nume-
ris absolutus; and the words sur-
reptitious and exposed^ in the sense
of made publicky smell strongly of
old Ben.

Of the phrase, " cured and per-
fect in their limbs," applied to
poetical productions correctly pub-
lished, some example may perhaps
be hereafter found in Jonson's

2 X 21

FOLIO EDITIONS

674

The Players' Preface to their
Edition of Shakspeare.

11. " Read him therefore, and
again and again ; and if then you
do not like him, surely you are in
some manifest danger not to under-
stand him."

Corresponding Passages in Jonson^s
Works,

works, though I have not met with
it.

11. Jonson was fond of this

contrast between reading and un-
derstanding. So, in his address to
the ordinary reader, prefixed to
Catiline, 1611 :

" Though you commend the two
first acts, with the people, because
they are the worst, and dislike the
oration of Cicero, in regard you
read some passages of it at school,
and understand them not yet I
shall find the way to forgive you."

See also his first Epigram, 1616 :
« To the Reader.

Pray thee, take care, that tak'st
my book in hand,
" To read it well, that is, to under-
stand."

From these numerous and marked coincidences, it is,
1 think, manifest, that every word of the first half of
this address to the reader, which is signed with the names
of John Hemings and Henry Condell, was written by Ben
Jonson. They perhaps had thrown on paper, in the best
manner they could, some introductory paragraphs, which
Jonson, not approving, instead of mending them, cured
by a total erasure.

Though he was afterwards (as I conceive) more merci-
ful, his hand may be clearly, though not uniformly, traced
in the second part also ; but the foundation of this latter
part, I imagine, was laid by the players themselves, and
the passage that relates to the writings and amiable man-

3 Copied by W. B. in verse, before The Bondman.

OF SHAKSPEARE'S PLAYS. 675

ners of Shakspeare, was unquestionably written by them,
("who, as he was a happie imitator of Nature/' 8ic.) for
it contains an observation to which Jonson particularly
alludes in his Discoveries, and in which he differed from
them. It is observable that although the rest of this
Address is plentifully sprinkled with Latinisms, in this
single passage, which I have no doubt was their own
composition, they say — and what he thought he uttered
with that easiness J that we have scarce received from him
a blot in his papers," using the familiar English word
(easiness) which would naturally occur to those unac-
quainted with Latin ; whereas Jonson, in his Discoveries,
writing on the same topick, says — *' wherein he flowed
with ikdit facility that sometime it was necessary he should
be stopp'd."

IL D°. 1632. Fol. Tho. Cotes, for Rob. Allot.

in. D°. 1664. FoLforP. C4.

IV. D°. 1685. Fol. for H. Herringham, E. Brewster,
and R. Bentley. Steevens.

MODERN EDITIONS.

Octavo, Rowe's, London, 1709, 7 vols.
Duodecimo, Rowe's, ditto, 1714, 9 ditto.
Quarto, Pope's, ditto, 1725, 6 ditto.
Duodecimo, Pope's, ditto, 1728, 10 ditto.
Octavo, Theobald's, ditto, 1733, 7 ditto.
Duodecimo, Theobald's, ditto, 1740, 8 ditto.

4 This edition of our author's plays is scarcer than even the
folio 1623. Being published towards the end of 1664, most of
the copies were destroyed in the fire of London, 1666.

Steevens.

676

MODERN EDITIONS

Quarto, Hanmer's, Oxford, 1744, 6 ditto.
Octavo, Warburton's, London, 1747, 8 ditto.
Ditto, Johnson's, ditto, 1765, 8 ditto.
Ditto, Steevens's, ditto, 1766, 4 ditto.
Crown 8vo. Capell's, 1768, 10 ditto.
Quarto, Hanmer's, Oxford, 1771, 6 ditto.
Octavo, Johnson and Steevens, London, 1773, 10 ditto.
Ditto, second edition, ditto, 1778, 10 ditto.
Ditto (published by Stockdale) 1784, 1 ditto.
. Ditto, Johnson and Steevens, 1785, third edition,

revised and augmented by the editor of Dodsley's

Collection of old Plays (i. e. Mr. Reed), 10 ditto.
Duodecimo (published by Bell), London, 1788, 20 vols.
Octavo (published by Stockdale), 1790, 1 ditto.
CroVn 8vo. Malone's, ditto, 1790, 10 ditto.
Octavo, fourth edition, Johnson and Steevens, &c. ditto,

1793, 15 ditto.
Octavo, fifth edition, Johnson and Steevens, by Reed,

1803, 21 ditto.
The dramatick Works of Shakspeare, in 6 vols, 8vo.

with Notes by Joseph Rann, A.M. Vicar of St.

Trinity, in Coventry. — Clarendon Press, Oxford.

Vol.i 1786

Vol. ii 1787

VoLiii 1789

Vol.iv 1791

^^1-^ '\ 1794

Vol. vi /

The Plays and Poems of William Shakspeare, corrected
from the latest and best London Edition, with Notes, by
Samuel Johnson, LL. D. To which are added, a Glossary,
and Life of the Author. Imbellished with a striking like-
ness from the collection of his Grace the Duke of Chandos.
First American Edition. Philadelphia, printed and sold
by Bioren and Madan, 1795.

OF SHAKSPEARE'S PLAYS. 677

The reader may not be displeased to know the exact
sums paid to the different editors of Shakspeare. The
following account is taken from the books of the late Mr.

Tonson :

•

/. s, d.

To Mr. Rowe 36 10 0

Mr. Hughes 5 28 7 0

Mr. Pope 217 12 0

Mr. Fenton6 30 12 0

Mr. Gay7 35 19 6

Mr. Whatley« 12 0 0

Mr. Theobald 9 652 10 0

Mr. Warburton 560 0 0

Dr. Johnson ' •

Mr. Capell 300 0 0

Of these editions some have passed several times
through the press ; but only such as vary from each other
are here enumerated.

To this list might be added, several spurious and muti-
lated impressions ; but as they appear to have been exe-
cuted without the smallest degree of skill either in the
manners or language of the time of Shakspeare, and as the

5 For correcting the press and making an index to Mr. Rowe's
12mo. edition.

^ For assistance to Mr. Pope in correcting the press.
' For the same services.

* For correcting the sheets of Mr. Pope's 12mo.
9 Of Mr. Theobald's edition no less than 12,860 have been
printed.

^ From the late Mr. Tonson's books it appears, that Dr. John-
son received copies of his edition for his subscribers, the first cost
of which was 375/. and afterwards 105/. in money. Total 480/.

Malone.

•

678

MODERN EDITIONS

names of their respective editors are prudently concealed,
it were useless to commemorate the number of their
volumes, or the distinct date of each publication.

Some of our legitimate editions will afford a sufficient
specimen of the fluctuation of price in books. — An ancient
quarto w?iS sold for sixpence; and the folios 1623 and
1632, when first printed, could not have been rated
higher than at ten shillings each \ — Very lately, seven
pounds, five shillings ; and seventeen pounds, six shillings
and six-pence, have been paid for a quarto ; the first folio
has been repeatedly sold for twenty-five pounds ; and also
for thirty-five pounds, fourteen shillings : but what price
may be expected for it hereafter, is not very easy to be
determined, the conscience of Mr. Fox, bookseller, in
Holborn, having once permitted him to ask no less than
iivo guineas for two leaves out of a mutilated copy of that
impression, though he had several, almost equally de-
fective, in his shop. The second folio is commonly rated
at two or three guineas 3.

At the late Mr. Jacob Tonson's sale, in the year 1767,
one hundred and forty copies of Mr. Pope's edition of
Shakspeare, in six volumes quarto (for which the sub-
scribers paid six guineas), were disposed of among the
booksellers at sixteen shillings per set. Seven hundred
and fifty of this edition were printed.

At the same sale, the remainder of Dr. Warburton's

^ I have since discovered, from an ancient MS. note in a copy
of the foHo 1623, belonging to Messieurs White, booksellers in
Fleet Street, that the original price of this volume was— owe
pound. Steevens.

3 And is not worth three shillings. See an account of it, in
the Preface to the present edition [Mr. Malone's, 1790].

Malone,

See, however, the Advertisement prefixed to this edition [1793].

Steevens.

OF SHAKSPEARE'S PLAYS. 679

edition, in eight volumes octavo, printed in 1747 (of which
the original price w^as two pounds eight shillings, and the
number printed, one thousand), was sold off : viz. one
hundred and seventy-eight copies, at eighteen shillings
each.

On the contrary. Sir Thomas Hanmer's edition, printed
at Oxford in 1744, which was first sold for three guineas,
had arisen to nine or ten, before it was reprinted.

It appears, however, from the foregoing catalogue (when
all reiterations of legitimate editions are taken into the
account, together with five spurious ones printed in
Ireland, one in Scotland, one at Birmingham, and four in
London, making in the whole thirty-seven impressions)
that not less than 37,500 copies of our author's works
have been dispersed, exclusive of the quartos, single
plays, and such as have been altered for the stage. Of the
latter, as exact a list as I have been able to form, with the
assistance of Mr. Reed, of Staple-Inn (than whom no man
is more conversant with English publications both ancient
and modern, or more willing to assist the literary under-
takings of others), will be found in the course of the
following pages. Steevens.

A LIST

OF THE

MOST AUTHENTICK ANCIENT EDITIONS

SHAKSPEARE'S POEMS.

1. Venus and Adonis, 4to. imprinted by Richard Field,

1593 4.

2. Venus and Adonis, 1596, small octavo, or rather

decimo sexto, R. F. for John Harrison.

Reprinted in 1600, 1602, 1617, 1620, 1630, &c.

3. Lucrece, quarto, 1594, Richard Field, for John Harri-

son.

Reprinted in small octavo, in 1596, 1598, 1600,
1607, 1616, 1624, 1632, &c.

4. The Passionate Pilgrim [being a collection of Poems

by Shakspeare], small octavo, 1599, for W. Jaggard ;
sold by W^illiam Leake.

5. The Passionate Pilgrime, or certain amorous Sonnets

between Venus and Adonis, &c. The third edition,
small octavo, 1612, W. Jaggard.

I know not when the second edition was printed.

6. Shakspeare's Sonnets, never before imprinted, quarto,

1609, G. Eld, for T. T.

4 In a manuscript diary that lately passed through the hands of
Francis Douce, Esq. there is the following entry on the 12th of
June, 1593:

" For the Survay of Fraunce with the Venus
and Adhonay pr. Shakspere

PLAYS ASCRIBED TO SHAKSPEARE. 681

An edition of Shakspeare's Sonnets, differing in
many particulars from the original, and intermixed
with the poems contained in The Passionate Pilgrim,
and with several poems written by Thomas Hey wood,
was printed in 1640, in small octavo, by Thomas
Cotes, sold by John Benson.

MODERN EDITIONS.
Shakspeare's Poems, small octavo, for Bernard Lintot, no

date, but printed in 1710.

The Sonnets in this edition were printed from the

quarto of 1609; Venus and Adonis, and Lucrece,

from very late editions, full of errors.
The Poems of William Shakspeare, containing his Venus

and Adonis, Rape of Lucrece, Sonnets, Passionate

Pilgrim, and A Lover's Complaint, printed from the

authentick copies, by Malone, in octavo, 1780.
Ditto, Second Edition, with the author's plays, crown

octavo, 1790.

Spurious editions of Shakspeare's Poems have also
been published by Gildon, Sewell, Evans, &c. Malone.

PLAYS

ASCRIBED TO SHAKSPEARE,

Either by the Editors of the two later Folios, or by the Compilers of
ancient Catalogues.

1. Arraignment of Paris, 1584^, Henry Marsh.

2. Birth of Merlin, 1662. Tho. Johnson, for Francis Kirk-

man and Henry Marsh.

5 It appears from an epistle prefixed to Greene's Arcadia, that
The Arraignment of Paris was written by George Peele, the au-
thor of King David and fair Bethsabe, &c. 1599.

682 PLAYS ASCRIBED TO SHAKSPEARE.

3. Edward 111.5 1596, for Cuthbert Burby. 2. 1599,

Simon Stafford, for ditto.

4. Fair Em \ 1631, for John Wright.

5. Locrine, 1595, Thomas Creede.

6. London Prodigal, 1605.

7. Merry Devil of Edmonton, 1608, Henry Ballard, for

Arthm- Johnson. 2. 1617, G. Eld, for ditto.
3. 1626, A. M. for Francis Falkner. 4. 1631, T. P.
for ditto. 5. 1655, forW. Gilbertson.

8. Mucedorus, 1598, for William Jones. 2. 1610, for

ditto. 3. 1615, N. O. for ditto. 4. 1639, for John
Wright. 5. no date, for Francis Coles. 6. 1668,
E. O. for ditto.

9. Pericles, 1609, for Henry Gosson. 2. 1619, for T. P.

3. 1630, J. N. for R. B. 4. 1635, Thomas Cotes.

10. Puritan, 1600 7, and 1607, G. Eld.

11. Sir John Oldcastle, 1600, forT. P.

12. Thomas Lord Cromwell, 1613, Tho. Snodham.

13. Two Noble Kinsmen, 1634, Tho. Cotes, for John
Waterson.

14. Yorkshire Tragedy, 1608, R. B. for T. Pavier. Ditto,
1619, forT. P. Steevens.

5 See the preceding extracts from the books at Stationers' Hall.

^ Fair Em,] In Mr. Garrick's Collection is a volume, for-
merly belonging to King Charles IL which is lettered on the
back, *' SHAKESPEARE, Vol. I." This volume consists of Fair
Em, The Meriy Devil, &c. Mucedorus, &c. There is no other
authority for ascribing Fair Em to our author.

y The existence of this edition has been doubted. Reed.

A LIST

PLAYS ALTERED FROM SHAKSPEARE.

Invenies etiam disjecti membra poetae.

Tempest,

The Tempest, or the Enchanted Island. A Comedy,
acted in Dorset Garden. By Sir W. D'Avenant and
Dryden, 4to. 1669.

The Tempest, made into an Opera by Shadwell in 1673.
See Downes's Roscius Anglicanus, p. 34.

The Tempest, an Opera taken from Shakspeare. As it
is performed at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane. By
Mr. Garrick. 8vo. 1756.

An alteration by J. P. Kemble. Acted at Drury Lane.
8vo. 1790.

Two Gentlemen of Verona.
The Two Gentlemen of Verona. A Comedy written by
Shakspeare, with Alterations and Additions, as it is per-
formed at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane. By Mr.
Victor. 8vo. 1763.

Midsummer-Night's Dream,
The Humours of Bottom the Weaver, by Robert Cox,
4to.

The Fairy Queen, an Opera, represented at the Queen's
Theatre by their Majesties Servants. 4to. 1692.

Pyramus and Thisbe, a comick Masque, written by
Richard Leveridge, performed at Lincoln's Inn Fields.
8vo. 1716.

Pyramus and Thisbe, a mock Opera, writte\i by Shak-

684

PLAYS ALTERED

speare. Set to musick by Mr. Lampe. Performed at the
Theatre Royal in Covent Garden. 8vo. 1745.

The Fairies, an Opera, taken from a Midsummer-
Night's Dream written by Shakspeare, as it is performed
at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane. By Mr. Garrick.
8vo. 1755 8.

A Midsummer-Night's Dream, written by Shakspeare,
with Alterations and Additions, and several new Songs.
As it is performed at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane.
8vo. 1763.

A Fairy Tale, in two Acts, taken from Shakspeare. As
it is performed at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane. 8vo.
1763.

Merry Wives of Windsor.
The Comical Gallant, or the Amours of Sir John Fal-
stafFe. A Comedy, as it is acted at the Theatre Royal in
Drury Lane, by his Majesties Servants. By Mr. Dennis.
4to. 1702.

Twelfth-Night.
In the preface to Love Betray'd, or the Agreeable Dis-
appointment, a Comedy, by Charles Burnaby, 1703, that
author appears to have taken part of the tale of tliis play,
and about fifty lines from it.

Much Ado About Nothing,
The Law against Lovers. By Sir W. Davenant. Fol.
1673.

* Garrick has produced a detestable English Opera, which
is crowded by all true lovers of their country. To mark the op-
position to Italian Operas, it is sung by some cast singers, two
Italians, and a French girl, and the Chapel boys ; and to regale
us with sensey'it is Shakespeare s Midsummer Night's Dream,
which is forty times more nonsensical than the uoorst translation of
any Italian opera-boohs."

Letter from Lord Orford to Richard Bentley, Esq. Feb.
23, 1755. See his Lordship's works, vol. v. p. 312.

FROM SHAKSPEARE.

685

The Universal Passion. A Comedy, as it is acted at
the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane, by his Majesties
Servants. By James Miller. 8vo. 1737 9.

Measure for Measure.
The Law against Lovers, by Sir W. D'Avenant. Pol.
1673.

Measure for Measure, or Beauty the best Advocate.
As it is acted at the Theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields;
vs^ritten originally by Mr. Shakspeare, and novf very much
altered : v^^ith additions of several Entertainments of
Musick. By Mr. Gildon. 4to. 1700.

An alteration by J. P. Kemble, acted at Drury Lane,
8vo. 1789.

Love's Labour's Lost,
The Students, a Comedy, altered from Shakspeare's
Love's Labour's Lost, and adapted to the stage. 8vo.
1762.

Merchant of Venice.
The Jew of Venice, a Comedy. As it is acted at
the Theatre in Little Lincoln's Inn Fields, by his
Majesty's Servants. By George Granville, Esq. (after-
vs^ards Lord Lansdowne.) 4to. 1701.

As You Like It.

Love in a Forest, a Comedy. As it is acted at the
Theatre Royal in Drury Lane, by his Majesties Servants.
By C.Johnson. 8vo. 1723.

The Modern Receipt, or a Cure for Love. A Comedy,
altered from Shakspeare. The Dedication is signed
J. C. 12mo. 1739.

Airs Well that Ends Well.
All's Well that Ends Well, a Comedy. Altered by
Mr. Pilon, and reduced to three Acts. Performed at the
Haymarket Theatre, 1785. Not printed.

^ This play is a pasticio formed from Much Ado About Nothing,
As You Like It, and Love's Labour's Lost. Boswell.

686

PLAYS ALTERED

Airs Well that Ends Well, a Comedy, altered by
J. P. Kemble, acted at Drury Lane. 8vo.

Taming of the Shrew.

Sawny the Scott, or the Taming of the Shrew, a
Comedy, as it is now acted at the Theatre Royal, and
never before printed. By John Lacy. 4to. 1698.

The Cobler of Preston, a Farce, as it is acted at the
new Theatre in Lincoln's Inn Fields. By Christopher
Bulluck. 12mo. 1716.

The Cobler of Preston, as it is acted at the Theatre
Royal in Drury Lane, by his Majesty's Servants. By C.
Johnson. 8vo. 1716.

A Cure for a Scold, a Ballad Opera, by James Wors-
dale. Taken from the Taming of the Shrew. 8vo.
[1735.]

Katharine and Petruchio. By Mr. Garrick. 8vo. 1756.
Wijiter's Tale.

The Winter's Tale, a Play, altered from Shakspeare.
By Charles Marsh. 8vo. 1756.

Florizel and Perdita. By Mr. Garrick. 8vo. 1758.

Sheepshearing, or Florizel and Perdita. By Macna-
mara Morgan, Dublin. 12mo. 1767.

The Sheep-shearing, a dramatick Pastoral. In three
Acts. Taken from Shakspeare. As it is performed at
the Theatre Royal in the Haymarket. 8vo. 1777.

An alteration by J. P. Kemble, acted at Drury Lane.
8vo. 1802.

Macbeth.

Macbeth, a Tragedy, with all the Alterations, Amend-
ments, Additions, and new Songs ; as it is now acted at
the Duke's Theatre. By Sir William D'Avenant. 4to.
1674.

The Historical Tragedy of Macbeth (written originally
by Shakspeare) newly adapted to the stage, with Altera-

FROM SHAKSPEARE.

687

tions, as performed at the Theatre in Edinburgh. 8vo.
1753. By Mr. Lee.

King John.

Papal Tyranny in the Reign of King John, a Tragedy,
as it is acted at the Theatre Royal in Covent Garden, by
his Majesty's Servants. By Colley Gibber. 8vo. 1744.

An alteration by J. P. Kemble, acted at Drury Lane.
Bvo. 1801.

King Richard II.

The History of King Richard the Second. Acted at
the Theatre Royal under the title of the Sicilian Usurper :
with a prefatory Epistle in Vindication of the Author,
occasioned by the prohibition of his Play on the Stage.
By N.Tate. 4to. 1681.

The Tragedy of King Richard II. altered from Shak
speare. By Lewis Theobald. 8vo. 1720.

King Richard II. a Tragedy, altered from Shakspeare,
and the Style imitated. By James Goodhall. Printed at
Manchester. 8vo. 1772.

King Henri/ IV. Part I.
King Henry IV. with the Humours of Sir John FalstafF,
a Tragi-comedy, as it is acted at the Theatre in Little
Lincoln's Inn Fields, by his Majesty's Servants. Revived
with Alterations. By Mr. Betterton. 4to. 1700.

King Henri/ IV. Part II.
The Sequel of Henry IV. with the Humours of Sir John
Falstaft' and Justice Shallow; as it is acted by his
Majesty's Gompany of Gomedians at the Theatre Royal
in Drury Lane. Altered from Shakspeare by the late Mr.
Betterton. 8vo. No date.

King Henry V.
King Henry V. or the Gonquest of France, a Tragedy
altered by J. P. Kemble, acted at Drury Lane. 8vo.
VOL. II. 2! Y

688

PLAYS ALTERED

King Henri/ VI. Three Parts.

Henry the Sixth, the First Part, with the Murder of
Humphrey Duke of Glocester. As it was acted at the
Duke's Theatre. By John Crowne. 4to. 1681.

Henry the Sixth, the Second Part, or the Misery of
Civil War. As it was acted at the Duke's Theatre. By
John Crowne. 4to. 1681.

Humfrey Duke of Gloucester, a Tragedy, as it is acted
at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane, by his Majesty's
Servants, [A few speeches and lines onli/ borrowed from
Shakspeare.] By Ambrose Philips. 8vo. 1723.

An Historical Tragedy of the Civil Wars in the Reign
of King Henry VI. (being a sequel to the Tragedy of
Humfrey Duke of Gloucester, and an Introduction to the
Tragical History of King Richard III). Altered from
Shakspeare in the year 1720. By Theo. Cibber. 8vo.
No date. [1723.]

The Roses ; or King Henry the Sixth ; an Historical
Tragedy. Represented at Reading School, Oct. 15, 16,
and 17, 1795. Compiled principally from Shakspeare.
Bvo. Elmsly, &c. This compilation is said to have been
the work of the Rev. Dr. Valpy.

King Richard III.
The Tragical History of King Richard III. Altered
from Shakspeare. 4to. 1700. By Colley Cibber.

Troilus and Cressida,
Troilus and Cressida, or Truth found too late. A
Tragedy, as it is acted at tha Duke's Theatre. By John
Dryden. 4to. 1679.

Coriolanus,

The Ingratitude of a Commonwealth, or the Fall of
Caius Martins Coriolanus. As it is acted at the Theatre
Royal. ByNahumTate. 4to. 1682.

The Invader of his Country, or the Fatal Resentment.

FROM SHAKSPEARE.

689

As it is acted at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane, by his
Majesty's Servants. By John Dennis. Svo. 1720.

Coriolanus, or the Roman Matron, a Tragedy, taken
from Shakspeare and Thomson. As it is acted at the
Theatre Royal in Co vent Garden : to which is added the
Order of the Ovation. By Thomas Sheridan. Svo. 1755.

Coriolanus, a Tragedy, altered by J. P. Kemble, acted
at Drury Lane. Svo. 1801.

Julius Ccesar.

The Tragedy of Julius Csesar, v^ith the Death of Brutus
and Cassius : written originally by Shakspeare, and since
altered by Sir William D'Avenant and John Dryden,
Poets Laureat; as it is now acted by his Majesty's Com-
pany of Comedians at the Theatre Royal. To which is
prefixed the Life of Julius Csesar, abstracted from Plu-
tarch and Suetonius. 12mo. 1719.

The Tragedy of Julius Csesar, altered, with a Prologue
and Chorus. 4to. 1722.

The Tragedy of Marcus Brutus, with the Prologue and
the two last Chorusses. 4to. 1722. Both by John
Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham.

Antony and Cleopatra,
Antony and Cleopatra, an Historical Play written by
William Shakspeare, fitted for the Stage by abridging
only ; and now acted at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane,
by his Majesty's Servants. By Edward Capell. 12mo.
1758.

King Lear.

The History of King Lear, acted at the Duke's Theatre.
Revived with Alterations. ByNahumTate. 4to. 1681.

The History of King Lear, as it is performed at the
Theatre Royal in Covent Garden. By George Colman.
Svo. 1768.

Hamlet.

Hamlet, altered by Mr. Garrick. Acted at Drury
Lane, 1771. Not printed.

2! Y 2

690

PLAYS ALTERED

Cymbeline.

The Injured Princess, or the Fatal Wager. As it was
acted at the Theatre Royal, by his Majesty's Servants.
By Tho. Durfey. 4to. 1682.

Cymbeline, King of Great Britain, a Tragedy, written
by Shakspeare, with some Alterations. By Charles
Marsh. 8vo. 1755.

Cymbeline, a Tragedy, altered from Shakspeare.
As it is performed at the Theatre Royal in Covent Garden.
By W. Hawkins. 8vo. 1759.

Cymbeline, altered by Mr. Garrick. Acted at Drury
Lane, 1761. 12mo. 1762.

Timon of Athens,

The History of Timon of Athens, the Man-hater. As
it is acted at the Duke's Theatre ; made into a Play, by
Thomas Shadwell. 4to. 1678.

Timon of Athens. As it is acted at the Theatre
Royal on Richmond Green. Altered from Shakspeare
and Shadwell. By James Love. 8vo. 1768.

Timon of Athens, altered from Shakspeare, a tragedy,
as it is acted at the Theatre Royal in Drury Lane. By
Mr. Cumberland. 8vo. 1771.

Timon of Athens, altered from Shakspeare and Shad-
well, by Mr. Hull, was acted at Covent Garden, 1786,
Not printed.

Romeo and Juliet,

Romeo and Juliet, altered into a Tragi-comedy, by
James Howard, Esq. See Downes, p. 22.

Caius Marius, by Tho. Otway. 4to. 1680.

Romeo and Juliet, a Tragedy, revised and altered from
Shakspeare. By Theo. Gibber. 8vo. No date. [1744.]

Romeo and Juliet, altered by Mr. Garrick. 12mo.
1750.

From the Preface to the Republication of Marsh's

FROM SHAKSPEARE.

691

Cymbeline in 1762, it appears that he had likewise made
an alteration of Romeo and Juliet.

Comedy of Errors.

An alteration of this play under the title of Every
Body Mistaken, was acted at Lincoln's Inn Fields, 1716,
but was never printed.

The Comedy of Errors, as it is acted at the Theatre
Royal in Covent Garden, 1779. Altered by Mr. Hull.

The Twins, or Which is Which, in three Acts, altered
by Mr. Woods, was acted at Edinburgh, and printed in a
collection of farces at Edinburgh, 1786, vol. iv.

Titus Andronicus.
Titus Andronicus, or the Rape of Lavinia. Acted at
the Theatre Royal. A Tragedy, altered from Mr. Shak-
speare's Works. By Edward Ravenscroft. 4to. 1687.

Pericles, Prince of Tyre.
Marina, a Play of three Acts, by George Lillo. 8vo.
1738.

One of the alterations of Shakspeare is of so singular a
nature, that the reader may probably be pleased in having
an account of it, as I believe [See p. 689.] it has never ap-
peared in print, I mean Mr. Garrick's alteration of Hamlet
in 1771. There cannot well be a greater proof of the pre-
valence of French criticism at a former period, than that
an actor who professed himself desirous to " lose no drop
of that immortal man,'' could have thought that he was
doing the publick a service in so grossly sophisticating
one of his noblest plays. The copy which he made use
of for his supposed corrections, was one which was
printed in 4to. 1703, and probably exhibited Hamlet as it
was acted by Betterton, and will furnish another instance
of the liberties which were taken with Shakspeare at the
beginning of the last century. The following is the
Advertisement to the Reader :

' This play being too long to be conveniently acted, such

692

PLAYS ALTERED

places as might be least prejudicial to the plot or sense are
left out upon the stage : but that we may no way wrong
the incomparable author, are here inserted according to
the original copy with this mark [ " ^' ]/

The reader would scarcely anticipate that the greater
part of Hamlet's address to his father's ghost is marked
for omission. It stands thus for representation.

Horatio. Look, my Lord, where it comes.
Hamlet. Angels and ministers of grace, defend us,

******* -X--X-

* * * * ^i^at may this mean,

That thou, dead corse, again in complete steel, &c.

But to return to Mr. Garrick. 1 shall not fatigue the
reader with minute alterations, or such arrangements as
were merely designed for convenience in acting, but shall
produce one instance of a supposed improvement in Ham-
let's soliloquy at the end of Act IV. Sc. IV. His obser-
vations on his own character, which are the best clue to his
conduct,

• Now whether it be

Bestial oblivion or some craven scruple, &c.

are left out, and for the close of the speech, the fol-
lowing rant is substituted ;

Awake, my soul, awake !

Wake nature, manhood, vengeance, rouse at once !
My father's spirit calls ! the hour is come !
From this time forth, my thoughts be bloody all,
I'll fly my keepers — Sweep to my revenge.

It is generally known that he expunged the scene of the
grave-diggers ; but he did much more — he cut out the
whole of the last Act. The voyage to England, the de-
struction of Rozencrantz and Guildernstern, the funeral of
Ophelia, and the conspiracy against Hamlet by means of
a fencing match, are all swept away. After the second
scene of Ophelia's madness, Laertes utters that speech

FROM SHAKSPEARE.

693

which Shakspeare has put into his mouth at her ^rave.
" O treble woe/' &c. Hamlet enters, and the quarrel takes
place as in the original, ActV. Sc. I. but somewhat short-
ened, and then follows the conclusion of the play. The
king interferes with this speech :

King. We will not bear this insult to our presence.
Hamlet, I did command you hence to England ;
Affection hitherto has curb'd my power ;
But you have trampled on allegiance,
And now shall feel my wrath. — Guards.

Hamlet, First feel mine. \_Stabs him.

Here thou incestuous, murderous, damned Dane,
There's for thy treachery, lust, and usurpation.

l^King falls and dies.

Queen, Mercy ! Mercy, Heaven ! Save me from my son.

[^She runs out,

Laertes. What, treason, ho ! Thus then do I revenge
My father, sister, and my king.

[They fight : Hamlet is woufided ly Laertes, and falls.

Horatio. And I my prince, and friend. [Z)ram.

Hamlet. Hold, good Horatio : 'tis the hand of Heaven
Administers by him, this precious balm
For all my wounds. \_Enter Messenger.'] Speak ! speak !
what of my mother?

Messenger. Struck with the horror of the scene, she fled ;
But ere she reach'd her chamber-door, she fell ;
Entranc'd and motionless ; unable to sustain the load
Of agony and sorrow.

Hamlet. O my Horatio, watch the wretched queen,
If from this trance she wakes. O may she breath
An hour of penitence, ere madness ends her.
Exchange forgiveness with me, brave Laertes.
O may thy father's death come not on me,
Or mine on thee.

Laertes. Heav'n make thee free of it.

Hamlet. I die, I die, Horatio. — Come thou near,

[To Laertes,

Take this hand from me. Unite your virtues.

[Joins Horatio's hand to Laertes.

694 ACCOUNT OF AUBREY.

To calm this troubled land — I can no more,
Nor have I more to ask — But mercy, Heav'n. IDies,
Horatio. Now cracks a noble heart. Good night, sweet
prince.

And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.
Take up the bodies. Such a sight as this
Becomes the field — but here shows much amiss.

IFinis.'] Bo SWELL.

AUBREYS

Mr. Aubrey was born in the year 1625, or 1626 ; and in
1642 was entered a gentleman commoner of Trinity col-
lege in Oxford. Four years afterwards he was admitted a
member of the Inner Temple, and in 1662 elected a
member of the Royal Society. He died about the year
1700. It is acknowledged, that his literary attainments
were considerable ; that he was a man of good parts, of
much learning and great application ; a good Latin poet,
an excellent naturalist, and, what is more material to our
present object, a great lover of and indefatigable searcher
into antiquities. That the greater part of his life was
devoted to literary pursuits, is ascertained by the works
which he has published, the correspondence which he
held with many eminent men, and the collections which
he left in manuscript, and which are now reposited in the
Ashmolean Museum. Among these collections is a
curious account of our English poets and many other
writers. While Wood was preparing his Athenae Oxoni-
enses, this manuscript was lent to him, as appears from
many queries in his handwriting in the margin ; and his
account of Milton, with whom Aubrey was intimately
acquainted, is (as has been observed by Mr. Warton)
literally transcribed from thence. Wood afterwards quar-

* [This writer has been so often referred to in these pages, that
it would have been an act of injustice not to have preserved Mr.
Malone's testimony in his favour. BoswellJ

ACCOUNT OF AUBREY.

695

relied with Mr. Aubrey, whom in the second volume of his
Fasti, p. 262, he calls his friend, and on whom in his
History of the University of Oxford he bestows the
highest encomium^; and, after their quarrel, with his
usual warmth, and in his loose diction, he represented
Aubrey as " a pretender to antiquities, roving, magottie-
headed, and little better than erased." To Wood every
lover of antiquity and literary history has very high obliga-
tions ; and in all matters of fact he may be safely relied on ;
but his opinion of men and things is of little value. Ac-
cording to his representation, Dr. Ralph Bathurst, a man
highly esteemed by all his contemporaries, was a most
vile person," and the celebrated J ohn Locke, " a prating,
clamorous, turbulent fellow." The virtuous and learned
Dr. John Wallis, if we are to believe Wood, was a man
who could at any time make black white, and white
black, for his own ends, and who had a ready knack at
sophistical evasion 3." How little his judgment of his
contemporaries is to be trusted, is also evinced by his
account of the ingenious Dr. South, whom, being offended
by one of his witticisms, he has grossly reviled What-

* Transmissum autem nobis est illud epitaphium a viro per-
humano, Johanne Alberico, vulgo Aubrey, Armigero, hujus
coUegii dim generoso commensali, jam vero e Regie Societate
Londini ; viro inquam, tarn bono, tam benigno, ut publico solum
commodo, nec sibi omnino, natus esse videatur." Hist, et Antiq,
Univ. Oxon. 1. ii. p. 297.

3 Letter from Wood to Aubrey, dated Jan. ]6, 1689-90. MSS.
Aubrey. No. 15, in Mus. Ashmol. Oxon. — Yet in the preface to
his History of the University of Oxford, he describes Dr. Wallis
as a man — eruditione pariter et humanitate prsestans."

Wood's account of South (says Mr. Warton) is full of ma-
licious reflections and abusive stories : the occasion of which was
this. Wood, on a visit to Dr. South, was complaining of a very
painful and dangerous suppression of urine ; upon which South
in his witty manner, told him, that, * if he could not malce water
he must make earth.' Wood was so provoked at this unseason-

696 ACCOUNT OF AUBREY.

ever Wood in a peevish humour may have thought or said
of Mr. Aubrey, by whose labours he highly profited, or
however fantastical Aubrey may have been on the subject
of chemistry and ghosts, his character for veracity has
never been impeached ; and as a very diligent antiquarian,
his testimony is worthy of attention. Mr. Toland, who
was well acquainted with him, and certainly abetter judge
of men than Wood, gives this character of him : Though
he was extremely superstitious, or seemed to be so, yet
he was a very honest man, and most accurate in his account
of matters of fact. But the facts he knew, not the reflec-
tions he made, were what I wanted 5." I do not wish to
maintain that all his accounts of our English writers are
on these grounds to be implicitly adopted ; but it seems
to me much more reasonable to question such parts of
them as appear objectionable, than to reject them alto-
gether, because he may sometimes have been mistaken.

He was acquainted with many of the players, and lived
in great intimacy with the poets and other celebrated
writers of the last age ; from whom undoubtedly many of
his anecdotes were collected. Among his friends and
acquaintances we find Hobbes, Milton, Dryden, Butler,
Ray, Evelyn 6, Ashmole, Sir William Dugdale, Dr.
Bathurst, Bishop Skinner, Dr. Gale, Sir William D'Ave-
nant, Mr. Hook, Sir William Petty, Sir John Denham,
Sir Bennet Hoskyns, (son of John Hoskyns, who was

iable and unexpected jest, that he went home in a passion, and
uorote South's Life" Life of Ralph Bathurst, p. 184?. Compare
Wood's Athen. Oxon. ii. 104-1.

5 Specimen of a Critical History of the Celtick Religion, &c.
p. 122.

6 " With incredible satisfaction I have perused your Natural
History of the county of Surrey, and greatly admire both your
industry in undertaking so profitable a work, and your judgment
in the several observations you have made.'' Letter from John
Evelyn, Esq. to Mr. Aubrey, prefixed to his Antiquities of Surrey.

ACCOUNT OF AUBREY. 697

well acquainted with the poets of Shakspeare's time), Mr.
Josiah Howe, Toland, and many more 7. The anecdotes
concerning D'Avenant in Wood's Athense Oxonienses,
which have been printed in a former page, were, like the
copious and accurate accoiint of Milton, transcribed liter-
ally from Aubrey's papers. A person who enjoyed the
intimacy and esteem of so many distinguished persons,
must certainly have borne a very different character from
that which has been given of him by Wood, who was
remarkable for the violence of his temper and his strong
prejudices.

7 Hobbes, whose life Aubrey wrote, was born in 1588, Milton
in 1608, Dryden in 1630, Ray in 1628, Evelyn in 1621, Ash-
mole in 1616, Sir W. Dugdale in 1606, Dr. Bathurst in 1620,
Bishop Skinner in 1591, Dr. Gale about 1630, Sir William
D'Avenant in 1606; Sir John Denham in 1615, Sir Bennet
Hoskyns (the son of John Hoskyns, Ben Jonson's poetical father,
who was born in 1566,) about 1600, and Mr. Jos. Howe in
1611.

END OF VOL. II.

C. Baldwin, Printer,
New Bridge-street, London.

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Full text of "The plays and poems of William Shakespeare : with the corrections and illustrations of various commentators: comprehending a life of the poet, and an enlarged history of the stage"

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